Inside Out
by lakariana
Summary: One cold morning a man with no heart and one hand is found floating aboard an abandoned sailing ship off the coast of Maine. The investigation will lead one FBI agent to a small town where not only their secrets but also his own will be revealed. Canon divergent story from 4x10.
1. Chapter 1

**Authors note:**

In honour of Once ending, and the loss of my favourite pirate from my life, I have decided to finish off as many half written fics sitting in my computer as I can. There are some that have sat there for years and this is one of the oldest.

I abandoned this originally because I thought the premise might be flawed. So if it is please let me know. I've thoroughly confused myself looking into the mechanics of magic on the show. Now cast your minds back to season four and I hope you enjoy reading.

This is cannon divergent from after 4x10 so, Previously on Once Upon a Time:

-Emma brought Robin's wife back from the past and Robin left Regina to to go back to her, so Regina is heart broken and Angry at Emma

-The Snow Queen Ingrid put an ice wall around town in an effort to force Emma and Elsa to become her sisters.

-Gold found a way to release himself from the dagger while simultaneously telling Belle that he loved her enough to give up on being the all powerful Dark One.

-He has been collecting magic into the sorcerer's hat to accomplish that spell.

-He also took Hook's heart as Ingrid told him he needs it for the spell.

-Ingrid set off her Shattered Sight curse and the town turned on each other.

-Emma, Elsa and Ana confronted Ingrid and she regretted what she'd done and took her curse back killing herself.

-The curse broke and everyone met up to celebrate, hugging in the falling snow, everyone except Hook.

 **Disclaimer:** I don't own Once Upon a Time or its characters this is a work of fiction written for fun.

….

Chapter one

 _Good morning, this is your local nine O'clock news._

 _In the early hours of this morning the coast guard found a real life Marie Celeste floating off the coast of Maine. The luxury yacht was boarded after it failed to respond to radio calls and officers discovered a single deceased occupant. Details are scarce but the FBI have joined local police forces in the investigation. More as we hear it. In other news….._

...

"Sorry Granny, coffee to go. I am so late," Emma gasped as she burst through the door of the old lady's dinner.

She had been with Elsa, Anna and Kristoff taking down Ingrid's ice wall at the town line. Of course Ingrid had made sure it wouldn't be that easy, some sort of magical barrier had stayed up even after the ice had melted. She hadn't meant to spend so much time there but she'd got drawn into a conversation about some sort of war in their home kingdom and then she'd had to swing by Regina's to ask the queen to check out the new magic at the town line.

Emma bit her lip and shook her head lightly to stop her thoughts drifting to her almost foster mother who was actually also a princess from the Enchanted Forest and how she'd sacrificed herself to save them from a curse she'd started. Later. She'd sit and think it through later. She'd decompress and actually decide how she felt about it. Later.

First she had to find a way to get Elsa and her family back to Arrendale and even that was after cleaning up whatever messes had been caused by the Shattered Sight. She glanced around the regulars at the diner and didn't see anyone missing or anyone missing any important body parts. Maybe they'd actually got through this last crisis without any casualties?

"I'm surprised you had time to drop in at all," Granny commented as she poured out the coffee.

"Why do you say that?" Emma asked. Ok she'd just admitted she was late opening the station but it's not like there was going to be a queue waiting or something.

"Just figured you'd be dealing with the stranger," Granny replied, full of fake nonchalance.

" _What_ stranger?"

….

"Ah, you must be Sheriff Swan. You guys don't run a twenty four hour service here?" the stranger said as a greeting.

Strangers were never good news in this town. Strangers meant change, upheaval and lately world ending crises. Wasn't Emma allowed a day of peace? Now she had to deal with some tall guy in a cheap suit and shades lounging on the locked doors of the sheriff station.

"If people need us they know how to reach us," Emma replied. Yeah, magic smoke, mirrors, shouting dwarf, all the usual forms of communication, she thought to herself. The guy cocked his head at her.

"Well, I need you," he said.

"And you appear to be contacting me," Emma said stiffly. They broke the little staring match they'd fallen into as her father jogged over to them, concern already etched onto his face "Start with your name and why you're in my town." Emma felt David glance at her at her use of the word _my_. She was going to pay for that later.

"Right. Special Agent Jack Hill with the FBI out of the Maine field office. I'm here following a lead on a murder." He pulled out his badge and Emma found herself staring at it completely dumbfounded. What in the actual hell?

"What murder could have anything to do with us? David Nolan, I'm also sheriff," David said introducing himself while reaching out to shake Agent Hill's hand.

"Well it's a bit of an odd one Sheriff. The deceased was actually found by the coast guard floating in an abandoned boat, not too far down the coast from here. Forensics can't find any evidence of anyone else on board. The only thing we did find was a handwritten note appearing to be written by the victim with what we assume is his name and directions to this town," Hill explained with a professional nonchalance that spoke to his experience. Emma hoped murders never became an everyday occurrence for her.

"That doesn't sound like a murder. What's the name?" Emma asked, her curiosity overcoming her worries about the freaking FBI being in Storybrooke.

"Captain Killian Jones." Agent Hill said and Emma's world ended.

...


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter two

Small towns could be strange places but this town was going for some sort of record. Agent Hill was sure Sheriff Nolan had been carrying a long sword when he'd arrived and Sheriff Swan had been completely ignoring his presence after he'd explained why he was here. He glanced around the Sheriff's station as the two sheriffs studied the summary file he had brought with him.

It was quaint and serviceable, not many personal items around, weirdly most of the technology looked like it had been bought in the nineties or eighties and never updated. Although that matched what he'd seen of the rest of the town, this was obviously one of those isolated small towns where time didn't move at the same pace as the rest of the world.

A quiet curse from Sheriff Nolan brought Hill out of his musing. The two sheriffs had laid the crime scene photos across the desk and were staring at them in shock. They definitely knew the deceased and from their reaction they most likely hadn't been involved in the murder, unless they were very good actors.

"So you can confirm that's him?" he asked unnecessarily.

Emma was frozen, staring at each photo as her dad laid them out in neat rows. Stupid stupid Emma, she thought viciously. Got through the last crisis did we? Checking random people at Granny's are alright but not your own boyfriend? God, she hadn't even got as far as thinking of their relationship that way and now he was gone.

Vaguely she heard David confirming Killian's identity, but it was like hearing people speaking through water. A couple of the group homes Emma had stayed in took the kids out to a public pool. They were always crowded and noisy. Emma used to sink to the bottom and gaze up at the broken lights through the surface and feel far removed from the muffled noises. It was always disappointing to be forced to return to the surface to gasp lungfuls of air.

What was David saying now? Something about whether or not Killian had any enemies in town? Emma could feel a giggle building in her chest, recognised it was hysteria and held her breath to prevent it escaping. Traitorous tears filled her eyes instead making her vision swim and blurring the photos. How could that be Killian? The man in the photos was slumped over like a broken doll leaning against a boat's hull. There was no swagger, no grace. As if that's how Captain Hook meets his end. All alone floating on some random boat.

"Emma," David's voice snapped her back to the present. "Sweetheart you've gone pale. Sit down. Don't look at them any more." He swept the photos up into the file and pushed her into a chair in almost one motion.

"I'm fine," She replied automatically.

"Well you shouldn't be," he replied gently, forcing her to look him in the eye. "Do you need a moment alone?" Emma stared at him and managed a nod, feeling grateful and understood. Her father literally pushed Agent Hill out the office door before he could comment on her reaction or David's use of the word sweetheart.

…..

"So," Hill said when they reached the street and Nolan had stopped pushing him along. "I take it you both knew Captain Jones well? Sheriff Swan better than most?"

Nolan gave him a glare before sighing deeply. "Yeah," he admitted. "You could say that."

"It's interesting because the only record I could find for him was an arrest and release without charge in New York, and you know who the plaintiff was? Emma Swan."

"I don't think interesting is the right word," Nolan replied severely. "I don't know anything about that, and the charges were dropped so I don't know what point you're trying to make. Look, I have to make some phone calls, can you see that dinner down the road? Granny's? I'll come meet you there in a few minutes."

Hill looked to where the other man pointed and saw a pretty dinner with an outside eating area near the end of the road.

"Sure," he confirmed. "But don't take too long. I have a lot of questions."

"I have no doubt about that," Nolan replied. Hill felt the sheriff's eyes on his back as he walked away.

The diner's bell tinkled as he entered and he gave the room what he hoped was a non threatening smile as the patrons all openly stared at him in silence. Hooray for small town stereotypes.

"You planning on staying?"

Hill turned in surprise towards the source of the demanding question and saw an older lady leaning on the counter next to him. "Well?" she asked. "I only have the one room ready at the moment so if you want it say now or forever hold your peace."

"Room?" Hill asked in confusion.

"You're not from town. This is an inn. Do you want a room?" she said slowly, her head tilted to the side both questioning and mocking him.

"Oh, right," he laughed. "That obvious am I?" she raised an eyebrow at him. The rest of the diner was still watching them in silence. "Right," he said in embarrassment. "Yes please Madam."

"Call me Granny," she said moving towards the back door presumably to another part of the building.

"Like the sign outside," Hill pointed out.

"Hey you don't miss a trick," Granny said sarcastically. "Some sort of detective are you?"

"FBI Special Agent actually," he corrected. Granny froze and turned to stare at him in surprise apparently lost for words.

"What do you want with our town?" came an accusing gruff shout. Hill was confronted by a short stocky man in denim who jumped off one of the bar stools in an attempt to get in his face.

"I'm here to find a murderer," he replied bluntly. The gruff man stepped back in surprise and blinked at him. "Not going to tell me this is a perfect little town and the people here couldn't possibly commit murder?" the agent challenged, internally scolding his confrontational nature. Great way to get the locals on your side Jack, he groaned at himself.

"We're not that kind of town," the gruff man murmured, exchanging a glance with Granny.

"Who was murdered?" she asked. Hill weighed up the pros and cons of divulging the details to a room of strangers and possible suspects. The sheriffs won't thank him, then again small town gossip would probably have everyone knowing by the afternoon anyway, maybe someone would give something away if he shocks them with information?

"It was a Captain Killian Jones," he declared, deciding to just go for it. The room instantly filled with concerned and excited muttering, no one made a sudden dash for the exits though.

"How do you know?" the gruff man demanded.

"I've just come from the sheriffs, they confirmed it was him."

"Oh Emma, that poor girl," Granny said softly. "I don't understand how you're here though. Did someone bring you in?"

"No, we found Captain Jones along the coast-" he tried to explain, starting to regret getting into the story in such an unprofessional way.

"But the ice wall," someone in a booth cut in.

"Ice wall?" Hill asked.

"Emma and Elsa took it down," Granny dismissed. Before Hill could ask what they were talking about the door jingled and David walked in, his frown growing deeper as he took in the tension in the room.

"So is it true? The pirate's really dead?" the gruff man demanded immediately.

"We don't have all the facts yet," Nolan replied, giving Hill a disapproving glare. "Agent Hill has only just arrived and the investigation is still very preliminary, but yes, it looks that way."

He spoke with an air of command and authority that was obviously respected by the townspeople in the diner. Hill added that information to the growing profile he'd started on the man in his head.

"Was it someone during the Shattered Sight?" a voice called out.

"As I said, we are only just starting the investigation," Nolan said his tone shutting down any further questions. "Agent Hill would you mind?" He gestured out the front door and then waved his hands at Granny in a series of signs to say he'd bring Hill back in a while and could she get the room ready for him. She just nodded silently in reply.

"Look I know what you're going to say..." Hill started once the door shut behind them.

"Oh good, because for a second there I thought you didn't realise you were about trigger mass paranoia and distress in my town," Nolan snapped. "What were you trying to achieve?"

"I thought I might get a reaction. Help gauge the locals impression of Jones and his murder."

"Well you've done that. I don't care who you work for. From now on, if you want to work this case you run everything through me. You don't talk to or investigate anyone in this town without me present understood?"

"Understood," Hill replied only just managing to keep the insolent tone from his voice. Nolan probably picked up on it anyway but chose to accept his statement without comment.

"Come on," he said instead. "I organised for the harbour master to talk to us."

"Sheriff Swan not joining us?" Hill asked as they walked across the road to where Hill could already see the ocean in the distance between the buildings.

"No. You were right before, despite how rude you were about it," Nolan sighed. "They were together. Emma and H- Killian. It hadn't been official for long. But they had..." The sheriff frowned and gave Hill and severe look deciding it wasn't his business. Hill nodded sympathetically and didn't push for more info. He may have a problem with authority and possibly a larger than average ego but that didn't mean he was devoid of empathy.

"So, what's this Shattered Sight thing?" he asked. The sheriff closed his eyes pressing his lips together in frustration.

"We've had a rough time of it in town recently. There was a lot of er...looting," he said, as he pointed at the nearby boarded up shop fronts. Broken glass and debris still lay scattered about, although some effort had been made to clear up.

"You catch the perps?" Hill asked.

"No," Nolan said though something gave Hill the impression the sheriff was holding back. "It was like the whole town went crazy for a while. Anyway, people started saying we were cursed and referred to the whole thing as Shattered Sight. Small town paranoia you know?"

"No, this town? But you all seem so open and welcoming," Hill snarked. Nolan gave him an unimpressed look.

"Hook used to hang out by these docks and as he was found on a boat, hopefully we'll get some answers here," he said.

"Hook?" Hill asked tilting his head at the sheriff.

"Oh that was just what we called him, you know like Captain Hook in the story," Nolan said slightly lamely, waving his left hand with his index finger curled.

"Right," Hill replied, not convinced at all.

…

There were chunks of ice floating in the water by the dock. Not like flakes that could have fallen off something refrigerated, but huge solid lumps you could stand on if you had enough balance.

"Wrong time of year for that isn't it?" Hill asked pointing at the ice. "It can't be that cold, surely?"

"Those are from the ice w-," the harbour master started to explain before Sheriff Nolan cut him off.

"Berg," he said loudly. "Iceberg. One of those huge rogue ones, like the one that took out the Titanic. Global warming huh? Blocked the harbour for a while. Did it come down this morning?" He asked the harbour master. Hill wondered about the ice wall comments he heard back at the dinner but kept his thoughts to himself.

"No, the ice… berg? It started melting pretty fast as soon as the curse ended Your Highness. There's no power strong enough to hold back the ocean," the man explained hesitantly.

The harbour master had an odd greyish complexion and eyes and mouth that were slightly too big for his face. The overall effect made made him resemble a giant walking trout.

"So Hook could have got a boat out of town anytime since yesterday afternoon?" Nolan suggested. The harbour master nodded and shrugged at the same time.

"Did you see Jones? Or anyone taking a boat out around then?" Hill asked.

"No sir," the man said regretfully. "I might have seen him around here during the curse but I wasn't all that focused on other people. After I came back to myself I went straight home to check on my wife. She was fine thank goodness."

"I'm glad to hear it," Nolan said smiling sincerely.

"Any idea whose boat this is? Or did you ever see Jones using it?" Hill asked, staying on task and ignoring all the curse talk for now. He held up his phone with a photo of the boat displayed. You could clearly see the boat's size and the name painted on the side. _Bounty._ Who named their boat something like that unless they were asking for trouble?

"No sir, sorry," the harbour master said shaking his head.

"It's not from here?" Hill asked looking at all the other similar boats waiting in their berths.

"It was here, yes," he answered.

"But you don't know who owns it or if Jones used it?" Hill replied sceptically.

"Lots of boats here," the man shrugged. "Not all of them belong to someone. Or it could be not all their owners are necessarily... in town." He glanced at Nolan as he said that and the sheriff gave the other man a tiny nod of approval.

"Really?" Hill demanded looking back and forth between them.

"We store a lot of boats here in the off season," Nolan cut in quickly. "I know we don't look like a tourist town but we get travellers coming through all the time. I'm afraid we don't really have a record of whose boat is whose." He turned back to the harbour master, dismissing the man before he let slip something that couldn't be explained away.

"Sure Your Highness, I hope I helped," he said obediently and left.

"Your Highness?" Hill asked.

"It's a town wide running joke. You should hear what we call our mayor."

…..


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter three

Sheriff Swan had moved into the glass partitioned office and was scrutinising the scene photos from the file, conspicuously avoiding any that had the victim in. Hill watched her as she ran her fingers over the image of Jones' note, tracing the elaborate handwriting.

"I'm sorry," he said aloud. He had tried to keep his voice low but she still jumped. "I obviously didn't realise you were in a relationship. If I had I would have been-"

"Less of a dick?" she asked sharply.

"More tactful," he corrected. She snorted and her eyes fell back to the photos.

"I thought you were with Dad?" she asked avoiding making eye contact.

"I was with Sheriff Nolan," he said to the side of her face. "But he had to take a phone call."

"Oh yeah, sorry it's a nickname," she said risking a glance at him to see if he was buying her explanation. "He can be a bit overprotective sometimes."

"You sure like you're nicknames in this town," Hill commented.

"It's like everyone has two identities," she said rolling her eyes at herself.

"Speaking of, you gonna tell me who Jones really was?" he asked, congratulating himself on the segue.

"What?" She replied sharply.

"The short bearded guy I met at the dinner called him a pirate. Another of those nicknames was it? I guess he went around causing a lot of trouble," he elaborated. He watched as she forced herself to visibly relax before answering. Strange. What was she hiding and was it connected to what everyone in this town seemed to be hiding?

"He made some bad choices that's all," she answered.

"That's often code for, he had a temper and couldn't always control it," Hill pointed out.

She was immediately tense again and stared hard at the photos refusing to look at Hill in case her face gave something away, but her hesitation was already all the answer he needed.

"He was changing," she admitted. "He _had_ changed. He was so different to when I first met him."

"You only started sleeping together recently then?" Hill asked. Her eyes shot up to his, the defiance and fury making them sharp, the tears only making them brighter. "Did he ever hurt you?" he continued pushing.

"He never-" she cut herself off with a significant pause. "It took me a long time to forgive him for his past," she restarted. "But I did. And he waited for me, he never forced me into anything. That meant more to me than anything else."

Emma shook her head at herself. Why was she spilling her guts to this guy? A bloody fed from outside Storybrooke as well, but something about the way he was talking about Killian, insinuating that he was nothing but a villain taking advantage of her, after everything he'd done to show her and himself that he was so much more than that. She couldn't listen to this stranger make assumptions and generalisations.

"I've never trusted anyone like I trust him," she finished. The look on his face said that her desperation had laid it on too thick.

"You're not the first woman I've heard give this sort of defence for a violent partner. You must know how-"

"He loved me," she snapped. "More than he should have," she added and then snapped her mouth shut, fed up with the lack of control of her emotions. What was Elsa's little phrase? Conceal don't feel. She pressed her lips tightly together and concentrated on pushing down her rolling emotions. Get rid of the fed first, then you can break down. She commanded herself.

"Did _you_ love _him_?" he asked and just like that Emma felt her tenuous control slipping.

Love. In all her life she'd never heard the word used as much as everyone used it in this town. Like the word itself was some kind of talisman. She hadn't decided yet dammit. She thought she had more time. She thought... The lights flickered and popped. Emma jumped up mumbling something about the fuses and jogged out the room.

Agent Hill watched her leave and leaned back in his chair considering the sheriff. She clearly regretted her outburst and was worried about what he would do with the information. But their relationship and Jones' past wasn't a secret to the second sheriff and probably not the rest of the town. So why the desperate need to hide it from him?

She strode back into the office with her head high, obviously having taken a moment to compose herself. Sadly she wasn't the first cagey girlfriend he'd had to get information out of and he didn't see any need to play gently with her just because she was a fellow law enforcement officer.

"You think you could be related to why he died?" he asked as soon as she sat back down at her desk. She jerked like he'd hit her.

"I don't have any jealous exs hanging around, if that's what you mean," she said as she turned away dismissively. But he could smell blood in the water and wasn't going to start pulling punches.

"What about a vengeance killing? You're in a position of authority here. That can breed resentment. Anyone in town hate you enough for this?" He was surprised when she laughed.

"You have no idea how ironic that would be," she said.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Hill spluttered. "Look, I can see the sort of connection you had. I'm here to find out who did this to him. To make sure they pay for it. Why don't you drop the evasive small town crap and let me help you? Don't you want to make whoever did this get justice?" She turned back to study him. He was surprised to see that although her eyes still shone with tears none had fallen. Heart of steel this sheriff.

"The villains don't always pay for their crimes in this town," she told him.

"Which villains in particular are we talking about?"

...

"Sheriff Nolan was Ok with not coming along?" Hill asked Swan as they walked down Main Street.

"No," she said. "But there's a lot of calls coming in and other crises that still need sorting out so he'll just have to cope."

That was a little bit harsh, Hill thought, the guy was obviously concerned about his colleague. He couldn't quite get a handle on the two sheriff's relationship, they were obviously friends but there was also something else. He'd think about it later, better to keep on task.

"So this Mr Gold and Captain Jones were enemies?" he asked as they approached the pawnshop.

"Is arch enemy too dramatic?" Swan asked. "They hate each other."

"What brought that on?" the agent asked. Swan stopped walking and heaved a big sigh before answering.

"Gold's first wife… ran off with Killian," she said. "Then Gold found them and...and she died. Killian blames Gold and they've fought ever since." Swan thought hard and then nodded to herself happy with the explanation.

"Was it his fault she died?"

"Yes," Emma said bluntly. Ok then, no trace of doubt there, Hill thought, frowning at the shop.

"It must be awkward for you?" he said.

"No, it was a long time ago. I didn't know her. And anyway Gold has remarried now and Killian…."

"Is in love with you," Hill finished for her. Swan gave him a scathing look. "You really shouldn't be on the investigating team," Hill pointed out, trying his best to sound sympathetic and not just argumentative. "You're too close to victim. You're bound to be emotional."

"Trust me when I say, you don't want to go up against Gold without me and you can also trust that I'll be much more trouble for you if you try to shut me out of the investigation," she stated firmly. Hill didn't doubt that.

"Ok," he agreed. "I get there's not much I can do to stop you. As long as it's noted that I think this is a bad idea. Also, you can trust _me_ when I say, if I think you're crossing any lines or your judgement is compromised I'm going to step in."

He waited to see how she'd react. She still looked pale but all the distress he'd seen back at the Sheriff's Office had been replaced by a hard determination. She blew out a harsh breath, probably wishing he had never stepped foot in her town, and nodded at the pawnshop motioning for him go ahead of her.

…..

"Emma!"

The soft jingle of the shop's bell was drowned out by the cry of a woman with bouncy dark curls and a round pretty face who flew over to the sheriff the second they opened the door. She pulled up short at the last second stopping herself from giving the other woman a hug although she clearly wanted to.

"Emma, we just heard. I'm so sorry," she said earnestly.

"Where's Gold?" Swan asked stiffly in reply.

"I'm here Miss Swan," announced an oily voice. A suited man with limp grey hair appeared from the room at the back of the shop. He carried an ornate cane but walked without any sign of a limp. "And who have you brought with you?" He asked squinting at Hill. Hill felt his skin crawl as the pawnbroker's sharp gaze assessed him.

"Special Agent Jack Hill," he said introducing himself. "FBI." Gold and the young woman exchanged surprised glances while Swan stayed silent watching them intently.

"Emma, no," the woman exclaimed. "Rumple didn't have anything to do with what happened to Killian."

"I want to hear him say that," Emma replied, her hard exterior not cracking an inch.

"I didn't have anything to do with what happened to the worthless pirate," Gold replied. Hill felt Emma tense next to him and moved forward a step putting himself between her and Gold.

"Rumple," the dark haired woman admonished him and Hill guessed this was Belle, the new wife Swan had mentioned.

Sheriff Swan and Mr Gold had fallen into a staring match and Hill had the oddest impression that they were both legitimately trying to read the other's mind. Emma squinted at Gold, a small frown appearing on her face.

"Are you in the same clothes as yesterday?" she asked. "You're not looking your usual polished self. Has something happened to throw you off your game?"

"I'm sure you'd love that, but no. My disheveled appearance is merely because I spent all that time protecting my wife and my business from the riot outside. The local law enforcement was notably absent."

Hill thought disheveled was something of an overstatement, but he could admit the man's suit was creased and rumpled in a way that would fit with having been worn for a while. His tie was only loosely tied around his throat as if he had been tugging on it and his hair had started falling in his face. He wouldn't have thought much of it if Swan hadn't mentioned it though.

"But that was yesterday," Swan pointed out challengingly and interestingly, from Hill's point of view, didn't bother to defend the Sheriff Office's actions with the looters.

Belle was looking back and forth between her husband and the sheriff in confusion. She moved closer to Gold and slipped her arm around his. He reluctantly stopped glaring at Sheriff Swan and smiled down at Belle. Hill was surprised to feel his muscles relax, he hadn't even realised he'd been tensing, subconsciously ready for an attack. Who was this guy?

"Emma," Belle said her earnest tone never fading. "I get that Rumple would be the first you'd think of, but I promise we've been here the whole time. We haven't even have time to go home yet because we were unpacking things for the shop."

"Unpacking?" Hill asked.

"We were finally going to go on our honeymoon," Belle smiled. "I've never been out of Storybrooke. Rumple was going to show me the world."

"I'm sensing a but coming," Hill said.

"We can't go anymore, something came up," Belle said conscious that she'd given a vague answer. Hill looked at Gold and felt his muscles tensing again as he saw the older man's hand was clenched so tightly around his cane his knuckles were white. Although his face looked nonchalant, the man was seething with rage.

"That must be a big disappointment," Hill said carefully. "What happened?"

"Not that it is any of your business," Gold replied. "But certain criteria had to be met for us to be able to leave and at the last minute we were let down."

"One of your deals not work out for you?" Swan asked not hiding her sarcasm. Gold mouth twitched up into a snarl but he pulled his anger under control and answered in a careful monotone.

"Something like that," he said.

"So, just so we can all say we asked officially," Hill said trying to diffuse the room's tension. "You are each others' alibis? There wasn't a point where you weren't together?"

"I was asleep for most of yesterday," Belle admitted. "But Rumple sealed us in the shop to keep us safe from the…." she glanced at Hill.

"Looters?" he supplied. She frowned and gave Swan a significant glance but nodded.

"The looters,' she agreed unconvincingly. "When I woke up the shop hadn't been touched and Rumple was right here with me."

"I didn't leave her side, I wouldn't risk her safety and the only way to leave the shop would have involved breaking the seals and then I would have been caught up in the Shattered Sight and you know that didn't happen," Gold said.

The look on Emma's face clearly stated she wasn't buying it, but they were getting nowhere fast so Hill was about to suggest they leave when Gold smiled. It wasn't a, thank god they're finally leaving, relieved smile or the sweet smile reserved for his wife, it was a smile of malicious victory. Hill did a double take but the smile had disappeared and Gold had gone back to looking as bored with their presence as possible. Hill knew he hadn't imagined it though.

"Let's go," he said to Sheriff Swan giving her a tiny push so she'd move ahead of him. He dragged in a deep breath as soon as the door shut behind him. The air in the shop had been heavy and given him goosebumps. It was relief to breath fresh air again.

"So, not awkward at all then," he said, once he'd shaken off the feeling. Swan gave him a dirty look, but she must have started feeling the strain because it was only half the power of the last one she'd given him. "You believe them?" he asked.

"Belle wouldn't lie," Swan said "But Gold did it. Even if he was only involved indirectly. He knows what happened."

"He's not giving anything away," Hill sighed.

"He didn't have to. I know he was lying. He was too smug and that comment about Killian being worthless…." The sheriff frowned deeply as she thought it over. Hill had a matching frown but it was directed at the sheriff rather than the creepy pawnbroker's words. It had seemed like a pretty standard insult to him.

"Wasn't that just a jab at you?" he suggested.

"No, there was something more to it. I know it," she said firmly.

"Well Sheriff, until we can prove it, you have any other suspects?"

….

"Are you seriously going to accuse your Mayor of murder with no evidence? You're obviously not worried about being re-elected," Hill scoffed as they walked through Storybrooke's town hall to the Mayor's office.

Emma had stopped answering his questions after he'd made a massive deal about how unsuitable her car was for police work. The only acknowledgment she'd made of his presence since then had been holding a door open for him, but that was only because it would have been childish to let it hit him in the face. She saw Regina's name painted on her glass office door and was about to speed up to it when Agent Hill made a quick grab for her sleeve. She jerked back pulling her arm away from him her eyes blazing with anger.

"OK, Ok," he said holding his hands up in surrender. "Look before you go in there let's just talk about this. Please?" Emma didn't say anything. "If you don't explain to me why we're here, I'll be forced to call Sheriff Nolan and suggest you're too upset to investigate."

Who did this guy think he was kidding? Emma pulled a face as she studied him. He actually looked sincere. She had no idea what this crazy town must look like to him. Her Dad had mentioned that he had already been asking about curses and ice walls. Damage control on this was going to be ridiculous. It was probably better to give him something rather than have him running around asking everyone in town.

"Regina hasn't always been as stable as she is now. In the past she…." Emma faltered, how the hell was she supposed to explain this without Regina or herself coming out sounding like a crazy person?

"She what?" Hill demanded.

"Yes, Miss Swan what?" a clipped angry voice asked them.

"Regina," Emma said apologetically as she saw the queen standing at her office door. She opened her mouth to apologise or explain but her words stuck in her throat.

"You have some nerve," Regina snarled. "What did you think, that I killed the pirate just to spite you? I don't get love in my life so of course I'll take away everyone else's. After all your talk of friendship and putting the past behind us. You never really saw me as an ally."

"We just have a few questions for you Madam, that's all." Emma heard Hill say next to her. Regina turned her glare on him and Hill actually gulped.

"I don't have to dignify any of your questions with a response," she growled and slammed the door in their faces.

"Well, that was-" Hill started.

"My fault," Emma sighed.

"Yeah I know," Hill said. "But I get the impression there's more between you than just you assuming she's a murderer."

Emma groaned loudly. She so did not have the time or energy for this. Of course she didn't really think Regina had hurt Hook. She just needed to keep moving and the Evil Queen was the next villain on her list. It's not like Regina didn't have a motive considering everything with Robin and Marian and how the whole situation was kind of Emma's fault. She shouldn't have let Hill get her out of Gold's. She didn't even need her super power to know he had been lying through his teeth. He'd done something to Killian and she was going to find out what it was.

"Mom?"

Emma's train of thought halted in it's tracks, her mind solely focused on how sad Henry's voice sounded when he called her name.

"Henry," she gasped when she saw him at Regina's door. She didn't even care why he was there, she was just relieved to see him, she practically ran to wrap her arms around him in a tight hug.

"I can't believe he's gone," Henry mumbled into her coat.

"No, I can't either," she whispered back.

She felt like her heart was breaking all over again. She knew Henry had got on well with Hook and seeing him so upset was bringing everything into horrible sharp focus again.

"It's ok Mom you can come in," Henry added, pulling away and opening the office door so they could go through. Regina was stood on the other side looking contrite but still annoyed.

"I'm sorry Emma," she said and she meant it.

"I'm sorry too Regina," Emma said her voice trembling slightly. "You're right I should never have even considered that about you. I know you wouldn't have hurt Killian. I just don't know where to turn."

"Well I guess I can admit that I would have considered me too if I was in your place, you know, considering." She waved her hands at the office in a way that encompassed Storybrooke too. They shared a consolatory smile. "Although," the queen continued. "I can think of one place I'd have looked for answers first."

"He's just as slippery as ever. I know Gold was involved but Belle's giving him an alibi," Emma said.

"An alibi," Regina scoffed. "Like that means anything."

"That's an interesting thing to say," Hill said from the doorway where he'd been listening.

"Mayor Mills, this is Special Agent Hill," Emma introduced. "He's the agent the FBI sent to investigate." Regina gave Emma a look that Emma returned with one of her own.

"Why is the FBI interested?" Regina asked.

"Well a dead body with no ID turns up floating in an unregistered boat in American water, we get interested," he said. Regina narrowed her eyes at him, not impressed by his attitude. "Then there's how he died."

"How he died?" Emma asked in surprise.

She realised she hadn't asked. She had taken enough time coming to grips with the fact he was dead, let alone going into the details. Her Dad must have hidden that part of Hill's file from her. She looked at the FBI agent imploringly, silently begging him not to say it out loud. The whole thing was still amorphous and unreal, but the more she found out the more it hit home. Killian was dead. Dead. He was never coming back.

"That's the thing," Hill went on breezily, oblivious to Emma's inner turmoil. "Someone removed his heart." Hill was completely focused on Regina's reactions and had forgotten the victim's girlfriend and a young boy was in the room. "He's only had the initial CT scan so far but externally there wasn't any obvious trauma. Best guess the coroner had was that it was removed surgically somehow, though they didn't know of a technique that would leave no incisions. We'll know more after the formal post mortem, unless you have any ideas about that?"

He looked at them all and winced internally at the expressions on everyone's faces, especially Swan's son. He was getting written up and sent to communication and compassion training again for sure. Then something very odd happened, the boy got almost excited and turned to Emma grabbing her arm to get her attention.

"Someone took his heart? That must be why he left town," he said. "They _made_ him and then when he was outside town there wasn't any ma-"

"There wasn't anything stopping him," The Mayor cut in. "What with what was going on in town. So, he took the opportunity and killed himself."

"No," Henry complained. "Killian wouldn't do that. He never gives up. You know that Mom."

"Maybe we didn't know him as well as we thought," Regina said gently but the boy shook his head.

"Wait," Hill interrupted. "Are you suggesting he removed his own-" his phone started ringing loudly in his pocket and he excused himself, walking to the other side of the room to answer it.

"Mom are you OK? Mom?" Henry called out to Emma when he realised she was just staring into space.

In fact she hadn't heard anything since the words post mortem had been said out loud. Hill really wasn't any good at tact. Didn't they teach the FBI communication skills anymore? She couldn't shake the image of Killian laid out lifeless on a cold steel table. A warm hand slipped into hers and she jumped.

"Mom," Henry said again softly. She looked down and saw her look of anguish reflected in his tear filled eyes. She tugged him to her and they hugged gently. Neither one capable of thinking of anything to say.

"Come sit down. I'll make us something hot to drink," Regina commanded bluntly but without any bite in her tone. A loud curse had them all turning to look back towards their FBI addition and were in time to see his expression drop into disbelief.

"What do you mean?" he demanded into the phone. "No, No! I assure you Sir, I have no idea how…. In all fairness I've been in the middle of nowhere the last…. Right….Do you want me to…..No. I understand. Yes Sir." They watched as he hung up and tucked the phone back into his pocket before running both hands through his hair pushing it up and back revealing his forehead and a strange jagged scar than ran along the hairline above his left eye.

"What is it?" Emma asked.

"Er...I'm not sure how to tell you this," he admitted as he joined them. "The body. Er, Captain Jones is missing. Presumed stolen."

"Excuse me?"

"Yeah I don't know. I've never heard of anything like this happening before," he said his arrogant FBI persona slipping for the first time since Emma had met him.

"How did you get that scar on your forehead?" Regina asked.

"Sorry?" Hill asked, unable to keep up with the sudden change in the conversation.

"That scar, how did you get it?" she repeated.

"Got it when I was a kid. I don't remember it. They think I got hit by a car. I was found by the side of the road with no memory of how I got there," he answered.

"Oh," Regina said noncommittally. "Well I'll go make us those drinks, you look like you could use one too Agent Hill."

If Emma had been paying attention she would have recognised the expression of anxiety and guilt on Regina's face, but she wasn't. Regina used preparing the drinks to brush off her concern and stamp her guilt deep down where it wouldn't show. When she carried the tray back to them there wasn't a hint of anything being wrong beyond finding out what had happened to Hook and she was going to make sure it stayed that way.

…...

 **Author's Note:** Thank you for reading, how'd you think it's going? Should I have left it languishing on my hard drive? Please leave me a review and let me know, I really appreciate all your comments. Considering how long I abandoned this for it's been surprisingly easy to finish off so it shouldn't be too much longer for an update. Thanks again for reading.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter four 

Hill dropped his overnight bag onto his bed at Granny's. The room was typical small town chintz and a lot more comfortable than the majority of the motels he'd stayed in in the past. He would have got a good night's sleep if his brain hadn't been buzzing with a thousand questions about the weird town he'd found himself in.

He threw himself onto the bed next to his bag and stared at the ceiling. Small Towns can be funny places. Sometimes they can be very suspicious of strangers, _outsiders,_ and become isolated and insular or they can put all their effort into projecting the perfect all American image, and protect their secrets maliciously. Sometimes they're just small places filed with ordinary people.

Hill had got definite clues to all the scenarios, but at the same time there was something else here. Let's face it the town's folk were plain weird. All that talk of curses and those odd nicknames. _Shattered Sight_ , I mean what the hell kind of name was that for a riot. And speaking of, in such a small town they must have known who instigated the looting, so how could there be zero arrests? Despite all that the town's people seemed totally happy with their sheriffs, apart from Gold, and even that was obviously a personal problem rather than a critique on the job Swan and Nolan did.

Every one of his questions had been met by an explanation that was just a little too vague, and little too light on actual facts. Ordinarily such cagey interactions would put that person on the top of the suspect list, but when it was the whole town, what was he supposed to do then? What could an entire town be hiding? Maybe if he saw that grumpy guy from the dinner again? He had a temper. Hill was fairly confident he could get the man to slip up and reveal something.

Ha, Grumpy, Hill thought, like the dwarf. And _His Highness_ Sheriff Nolan would be a prince with Emma Swan as a princess and hey, they even had a Captain Hook to boot. Maybe the town was really a fairy tale and that was the big secret. Instead of hiding they should open it up as a theme park, maybe a Disney themed one.

Thinking of Sheriff Swan got him remembering their weird meeting with the Mayor and Swan's son. Why had he been at the mayor's office anyway? Swan hadn't looked upset to see him there, she'd been the opposite if anything and he'd never got an explanation for why the mayor had been a suspect in the first place. Something about that woman had put Hill on edge. There had been a moment, when she handed him his coffee, that he had nearly refused to drink it. He absently rubbed at his wrist as he pondered the woman, something in his gut hadn't let him relax around her completely, he wished he could put his finger on what it was.

His phone rang and Hill considered not answering it. It was bound to be more bad news, but then it would probably be just as bad to ignore it. As if his body was made of lead he dragged his hand to his pocket and raised the phone to his ear.

"Hill," he said.

"Hello, it's Sheriff Nolan," Nolan's voice said brightly into his ear. "How are doing? Settling into Granny's OK?"

"Yeah, I guess," Hill replied noncommittally.

"Great," Nolan said. "We, I mean Mary Margaret my wife, and I, were thinking we'd treat you to dinner. It must have been a bit of a culture shock for you coming to our small town."

Hill frowned actually he'd been to plenty small towns in and out of work. He'd always lived and worked around this part of the country. They didn't need to know that though and this dinner might be a good opportunity to get some information. Despite the mess he was in with Jones' body going missing he still had a job to do.

"Sure," he agreed. "That sound good."

"Great," Nolan said. "We're actually not that far from Granny's, so ten minutes?"

"Sure," Hill repeated. "See you then."

"See you then," the Sheriff echoed.

Hill hung up the phone, his head rolling sideways to look out the window. There was a grey striped cat sitting on the roof opposite. Hill frowned when he realised the cat was staring right at him.

"You planning to start something?" he said at the cat. "Because I'm not in the mood." The cat grinned at him and winked.

Hill sat up so suddenly he knocked his bag off the bed and reflexively tried to catch it. He snagged one handle but the bag naturally popped open and spilled his things all over the floor. Hill looked back out the window but the cat had disappeared, as if it had never been there.

"This place is getting to you Jack," Hill muttered to himself. "Come on, pull it together."

He started to pick up his things, mentally cataloguing his clothes and toiletries so he didn't miss anything. Then his hand froze, half hidden under his spare shirt was a white plastic card. He slowly lifted the shirt to reveal an ID badge. An ID badge with someone else's name and face on. An ID badge for the mortuary Jones' body had been taken from.

Hill stared at it hoping his brain was still playing tricks on him. Where the hell had that come from? Why was it in his things? Was someone trying to frame him for the theft of Jones' body? If they were, they were doing a crappy job of it. He found a plastic bag and picked up the card by the edges, wrapping it gently so he didn't smudge any fingerprints and putting it on the desk to get into an evidence bag later.

Then he thought better of it and put it in his pocket. Was it a coincidence Nolan had called him just as he'd reached his room? Was dinner a polite invitation or a scheme to get him out the way so Swan could search his things and _discover_ the evidence they had planted. They and everyone else in this town obviously wanted him gone. Getting him investigated for stealing a body though? Was that a bit much? Not if they had been the ones that had killed Jones, it was sort of neat then, they got rid of the body and the investigating agent.

He shook his head dismissing his overworking imagination. Why plant the card ahead of time? Swan could just keep it and say she found it there and even if they got rid of him the FBI would just send another agent or more than one. No, the local sheriffs were definitely hiding something but he knew their reaction to Jones' death had been genuine. He patted the card in his pocket. So where had it come from then? He'd call head office about it later, he had a dinner date to get to.

….

As he turned the corner connecting the inn to the diner he heard Sheriff Nolan and a female voice he didn't know. He entered the diner quietly trying to eavesdrop without being obvious.

"This isn't a good idea," Nolan was saying.

"We need to know how he got here," the female voice replied. Hill peeked around the corner and saw the sheriff was with a petite woman with very short dark hair who was wearing a soft pale coloured jumper. She was holding a baby in her arms. Hill guessed she was the sheriff's wife.

"Hook wrote directions down," Nolan complained. 'Anyone could have turned up. I don't know what he was thinking."

"Charming, he was trying to send us help. You know that," Mrs Nolan replied.

"Do we?" he challenged. "We have no idea what's going on and this special agent is only going to cause trouble. Somehow he timed his arrival perfectly with the ice wall coming down and Emma being away from the station at Regina's."

"All the more reason to find out more about him," Mrs Nolan pointed out smugly.

"Ouch," Hill said loudly as he approached, making the pair jump. "I think my ears are burning for some reason."

Mrs Nolan had the good grace to look embarrassed and apologised for both of them as she ushered him into a booth. He was pretty sure he heard Nolan mumble something like _dick_ behind him as they sat down.

"So Mrs Nolan, did I hear you have some questions for me?" He asked as soon as they had given their food orders to the waitress.

"It's Mary Margaret, please," she said. "And he's David and I am sorry. We just aren't used to visitors in this town. It's a… shock in all honesty to have you here."

"Yeah I'm getting that," he replied. "You must get people coming through though, didn't you say you get people leaving their boats here in the off season?" he asked Nolan. He noted that Mary Margaret gave her husband an unimpressed eye that the sheriff saw but didn't respond to.

"Like I said this is the off season," he said. "And they just leave their boats here, they don't stay around asking questions."

Hill narrowed his eyes at them, but it was a reasonable explanation, vague and inadequate like everything else he'd heard in this town, but reasonable.

"So, did you have any trouble finding the town," Mary Margaret asked. On the surface an innocent everyday question, but she was a little too interested in his answer.

"No, Jones wrote some good directions," he said. "Although they were for a boat coming from the sea rather than a drive, it was pretty easy to match the location on a map."

"And you drove in… in a car?" she asked.

"Yeah, it's parked out back," Hill replied giving her a funny look.

"And you didn't see anything on your way in?...anything odd?" she asked.

"Like an ice wall maybe?" Hill asked back.

"That's a weird thing to say," Mary Margaret replied after a heavy pause.

"It is isn't it," he agreed. Nolan and his wife exchanged concerned glances. Well that was probably enough pandering to local eccentricity, time to get down to business, Hill thought.

"So how did he lose the hand?" he asked. They both looked at him in confusion. "Jones," he clarified.

"It was... violent," Nolan said.

"It would have had to be wouldn't it?" Hill laughed. "It's not like it fell off."

"Right well," Nolan replied looking offended at Hill's sarcasm. "It was cut off in a duel." That earned the sheriff a not so subtle shove from his wife.

"A what?" Hill asked thinking he'd heard wrong.

"A fight, with someone else. We don't know the details. Hook didn't like talking about it," Mrs Nolan answered, looked really uncomfortable now. The couple exchanged glances, like guilty perps with a juicy secret. Keep them on the back foot Jack and hope they slip up again, Hill thought to himself.

"Isn't that really rude?" he asked.

"What?" Nolan asked back.

"Referring to him by his deformity," Hill said. The couple blinked at him in surprise.

"We never saw it that way," Mary Margaret said.

"You never realised it was rude?" Hill asked innocently.

"No," Sheriff Nolan replied this time. A hand resting on his wife's arm as if binding them together against him. "As a deformity. It's who he was. He made that name for himself."

"So, he did have an actual hook? Because we didn't find one on the body," Hill asked.

"Yeah, he had a hook, it was silver, slightly bigger than your palm," Nolan said.

"Fitting for a pirate I suppose," Hill commented, watching their reactions carefully and noting that the title didn't phase them at all. "Sheriff Swan seems to think he was changing, becoming a different person. Leaving his violent past behind. So you two didn't share that feeling?"

"Of course," Mary Margaret said. "We could see he was different, especially with Emma, Er, Sheriff Swan, but you can't ignore where you come from, no matter where you find yourself." Hill studied her carefully and she shifted nervously in her seat. "He really didn't mind being called that," she finished slightly lamely.

"So where did he come from? Can't be Maine because there is literally no record of him, no birth, social security, no records of any kind except that arrest I told you about. We might have to get border control and Homeland involved."

"Small town remember," Nolan said sharply, letting Hill know he'd struck a nerve with his talk of the other agencies. "I'm sure we have hard copies of everything at the Town Hall."

"You don't register your citizen's data nationally?" Hill asked with fake astonishment.

"Not my department," Nolan said his frustration obvious.

"Well I'd like to see those records. Dot all the T's and strike all the I's, you know."

"Sure," Nolan said. Hill wondered if he'd gone too far threatening the sheriff with Homeland Security but it was too late to go back now. It wasn't like it was a real threat, Hill had no intention of contacting anyone else.

"Great," Hill replied mimicking the other man's tone. Mary Margaret looked between the two of them in concern and made a decision to halt proceedings before one of them said something everyone would regret.

"Oh no, look at the time. Sorry Agent Hill we really need to get back to our daughter," Mary Margaret announced even as she was standing. Hill frowned at the baby in her arms.

"It's not good for him, Er, her to nap outside in my arms. We're trying to get him to sleep alone. But in his crib. Under supervision," Mrs Nolan finally ran out of breath and the two made a quick exit out of the diner. He heard the sheriff complain they'd given him more info than he'd given them and he had told his wife so, before the door shut all the way.

Well that had been surprisingly awkward considering they'd been the ones to invite him to dinner. Granny appeared at that moment with their orders balanced on her arms and frowned at the empty seats.

"Where did they go?" she asked.

"They had to pop out but they said to put all this on their tab," Hill said gesturing for her to put all the food on the table. Granny gave him a pointed look.

"The pirate would have liked you," she sighed. Jack really didn't know how he felt about that.

...

After managing to get rid of Agent Hill on the pretence of giving him time to check in to his room at Granny's. Emma had suddenly found herself floundering with nowhere to go. She felt her emotions building up inside her chest like the rising tide and desperately tried to think of something to distract herself.

Henry was with Regina and as much as being with her son would comfort her she new she would be lousy company and didn't want to upset him more than he was already. Her mother had convinced her dad to have a go getting information out of Hill, Emma had just got rid of the rude special agent and no interest in talking to him anymore. Elsa was celebrating her reunion with her sister and, as close as she had gotten to the ice sorceress, she didn't think they'd want her around dragging down their party mood, and Killian… Killian just wasn't there anymore.

She knew where she wanted to go, she wanted to confront Gold again, but she didn't have anything more than she did that morning and the slippery devil wouldn't give anything up unless he was desperate. Right now he was far from that. Then again...

She wondered about the state he'd been in that morning. She would have put good money on betting he was already angry before they had arrived. Letting Belle greet them had been a telling move and if she was laying money down, she'd bet her pirate was the cause of Gold's anger. So why had Killian's death upset Rumpelstiltskin instead of making him happy? Something to do with why Gold and Belle couldn't leave on their honeymoon anymore? What were those _criteria_ that fell through for them? Gold wouldn't tell her anything but maybe Belle would?

Emma climbed back into her yellow bug. Now she had a direction to follow, she firmly pushed down her feelings of loss and refocused her anger on concentrating on the task at hand. She'd find out what happened to Killian first, after that she'd let herself start thinking about life without him.

Gold's car was still outside the pawnshop when she drove past and she kept on through town parking a couple blocks from the library before doubling back on foot just in case he had seen her. She wanted some time alone with Mrs Gold. Grabbing her lock picks from the glove box she walked as unsuspiciously as she could to the library's back door and knelt down so she would be inline with the lock. She slid the first pick in and the door knob turned and then Belle was standing there looking unimpressed.

"Why does nobody knock anymore?" she complained.

"Sorry," Emma apologised, standing up. "I thought you were still at the shop. I was going to ring and ask you to come over."

"OK," Belle said, stepping back. "You better come in."

She walked ahead of Emma as they moved to the main counter near the front of the door. Emma watched her carefully, her concern growing as she saw how stiffly Belle was moving and how dark it was inside. The librarian had only turned on a small desk light leaving the rest of the library shrouded in menacing shadows. Emma had never found the library intimidating before but the half light of the street lamps outside and Belle's small lamp light gave the stacks the disconcerting effect of being endless, the shelves of books fading away into darkness, like some sort of infinite maze.

"Is everything alright Belle?" Emma asked. Belle bit her lip and when she met Emma's eyes they were filled with tears.

"I think you're right. I think Rumple did something to Killian," she moaned.

"Why what happened?" Emma demanded. She knew she should be being gentler, Belle was obviously upset, but Emma didn't have enough headspace to worry about Belle's feelings on top of everything else.

"Rumple," Belle started. "He'd been odd all morning. He was distracted and short tempered. Then we heard that Killian… we heard about what happened to Killian." Her face slipped into the sympathetic expression that Emma was very quickly getting sick of seeing. "And he got this look on his face, I've only seen it a couple of times, back in the world old, when someone had crossed him."

"Crossed him," Emma repeated slowly, but Belle didn't elaborate.

"He went to his bag and looked inside and… Emma he got so angry. He told me to keep away from him for a while. You came into the shop a bit after that."

"But back then you were sure he hadn't done anything," Emma pointed out.

"I wanted to believe in him," Belle said, her voice cracking. "I wanted to believe in _us,_ that he had really chosen me over his dagger, over the power of the Dark One." Emma did feel stabs of empathy now. Poor Belle, Gold had never deserved her. "I didn't want to doubt him," she continued desperately, as if it was a flaw in her character and not her husband's. "The thought kept eating at me after you left. I could see it on your face. You were so sure Rumple had done something to Killian. So I… I looked in the bag."

Belle fell silent and Emma had to clamp down on her impulse to shout and demand to know what had been inside. Belle's eyes had slipped away from Emma to gaze at the shadows hiding the depths of her library. Her face morphed into deep despair and silent tears started falling down her cheeks. She opened a draw under the counter and pulled out a small wooden box, placing it very gently onto the countertop as if she didn't want to shake the contents.

"I put it in this box," Belle said quietly. "It has a preservation spell on it, nothing contained inside will degrade." She looked up and met Emma's eyes again, her tears falling faster. "I'm so sorry Emma," she said.

Emma knew what was in the box. She couldn't stop her hand from reaching out it, though her mind was already rebelling at the knowledge. The lid had a simple catch and she used one finger to slide it aside and the rest to slowly push open the lid. A heart lay inside. It didn't glow with life preserving magic. There was no swirling red and black marks to indicate the actions of a person's life. It was just flesh and blood. A human heart sitting in a box. Just like the fake one Regina had used to frame Mary Margaret before the curse broke. Emma let the lid snap shut. Silence fell in the dark library.

"You won't get in trouble?" Emma asked after what felt like an eternity. Somehow Killian and Belle had become friends and she knew he wouldn't want her to get hurt for him, especially with his history with Gold adding fuel to the fire.

"I can handle Rumple," Belle said firmly.

"Ok, but be careful," Emma said and picked up the box. The wood was smooth and hard under her fingers, just an ordinary wooden box. Emma wasn't sure what she'd expected but she was surprised to feel disappointment at the lack of anything extraordinary happening.

She hurried back to her car, caring less whether anyone was watching, locking the doors the second she was back inside. Her own heart thumped so hard she thought it'd escape her chest and she took two steadying breaths before she could open the wooden box again.

It was still a heart, nothing but flesh. What had she expected, that her magic would give it life again. That it'd start beating now it was in her possession and she could hope that maybe somewhere Killian was alive too? She was a fool. She closed the box and hugged it to her chest. Maybe it wasn't his. She didn't actually have proof that it was Hook's. Gold must have a collection of hearts. Shouldn't automatically protecting her loved ones be one of her true love powers? She shouldn't have thought that word. Love and Hook together in her mind has it sliding and spiraling away from her.

Her natural instinct to run and hide behind her walls had been competing with her need to not be alone. So she allowed herself to feel connected to another person, to him, and now that was no longer an option, all she was left with was devastation. He'd promised her, even though she'd warned him. He'd fed her that line about being a survivor and she'd bought it. How could he do this to her? After all his big promises. All the faith she gave him. He waited until she was distracted and died without her even noticing.

Because she hadn't noticed had she? The man that she was… with. That _maybe_ she was falling in love with and she hadn't noticed he'd had his heart ripped out and was being used by his greatest enemy. She hadn't missed all the clues, she'd known something was up with him but she'd brushed it aside to deal with after Elsa and her sister were sorted out. Maybe if she had paid him as much attention. Maybe if she'd just _asked_ about why he was acting strange, he wouldn't have had to-.

A car passed her on the road and she jumped realising her arms were aching from holding the box so tightly. She must have been sat there staring into space like a crazy person for ages. Whatever she may or may not have been feeling, whatever he may or may not have been feeling, it didn't matter anymore. There was no point thinking about it anymore. The only thing to think about was getting justice, to making Gold pay.

She placed the box very gently on the seat next to her and then after a moment's thought threw her coat over it and put the seatbelt on. Once she was happy it was safe and secure she did her best job of ignoring it and focused on driving home. She did such a good job of ignoring it she didn't notice the soft warm light that flowed from her chest, from her heart, to the one inside the box.

….

Special Agent Jack Hill had eaten too much at dinner. He'd been frustrated by the case and by his interactions with the town's people and by the missing dead body and he may have comfort eaten, a lot of food. Granny had an excellent cook. He walked across his room to the window and opened it a crack to let some cool air in.

Night had fallen over Storybrooke and the twinkling lights Granny had decorated her diner with made even the carpark sparkle like there was magic in the air. No matter how weird the town was, he had to admit, it was picturesque.

Jack leaned his forehead against the cold glass of the window and tried to think of his next move. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a movement, waiting for his eyes to focus he was shocked to see a dark figure half hunched over the trunk of his car. Just what he needed.

He grabbed his gun and was down the stairs and in the car park in a heartbeat, not even stopping to put on a coat, his shirt tails flapping in the breeze. The dark figure was still leaning on his car, the trunk wide open and as he drew closer he realised the back light had been popped off and left hanging by its wires.

"You just made a big mistake," Hill declared raising his gun. "That's a federal car you just- "

He grabbed the figure by the shoulder spinning them away from the open trunk and shoving his gun in their face. The man gave him an annoyed frown and pushed him away, ignoring the weapon completely. Hill stared open mouthed as the man stood straighter and brushed imaginary smut off his black leather jacket.

"Oi! Careful mate," Killian Jones complained, rubbing his chest. "I'm still a bit tender."

…..

 **Author's note** : Thank so much to everyone who reviewed, followed and favourited. It is very much appreciated. I hope you all enjoyed this chapter.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter five

Hill paced up and down the length of his room at Granny's. Every once in a while he would stop and frown or point or open his mouth to say something, only to find he couldn't think of anything and start pacing again. The very much alive murder victim sat and watched him pace with only mild interest as he waited for the feeling to come back into his limbs.

"How long did you have me folded up in that contraption?" Jones complained as he rolled his shoulders and winced.

"I didn't put you in there," Hill spluttered.

"You said it was your car," Jones replied.

"Yes but -"

"And you're the only one who's come to Storybrooke from the world outside, where I was headed last I knew."

"Yes but-"

"So, who else but you, Mate?" Jones asked, waving his hand around the empty room. Hill collapsed into a chair and dropped his head into his hands.

"It can't have been me. I don't remember it," he said mournfully.

He looked at Jones through his fingers and wished he hadn't. He couldn't even pretend this had all been some sort of con, because he could see the evidence of the truth with his own eyes. As Jones fidgeted on the bed his muscles were regaining their tone, returning the life to his facial features and posture. His skin was gradually losing the waxy sheen Hill had seen on every dead victim he'd investigated and was returning to a healthy pink and light tan that spoke of a man who worked largely outdoors. Jones stretched his legs and nodded, seemingly satisfied with his coordination. He stood up and leaned over the agent. His face not even slightly sympathetic to Hill's state of existential crisis.

"Don't worry about it too hard," he said. "Memory loss happens a lot around this town."

"Like ice walls and removing people's hearts?" Hill asked. And people coming back from the dead, he thought internally.

"Ha," Jones laughed. "I'm glad you are a fast study, speaking of which does the Crocodile still have my heart?"

"I have no idea," Hill said helplessly.

"Well," the dead man said, clapping him hard on the shoulder. "I owe you for bringing me back to town. But first, we need to get word to Emma and her family. I know Gold's plan and we are going to see to it that it fails."

…..

Emma stood with her parents and Regina around the dinning table in the loft, the wooden box sitting innocently between them.

"I can't believe it," Charming muttered.

"Are we sure it's-" her mother started to ask.

"I'm sure," Emma said flatly. The group fell into silence, no one taking their eyes off the box. Regina moved slowly and picked up the box, dropping a significant look to Snow as she carried it away and upstairs to Emma's room. When she came back down Snow had pulled Emma onto a stool at the bar and was pushing a hot chocolate into her hands.

"What are you planning to do?" Regina said, all business. Snow scowled but didn't say anything to stop the conversation.

"I'm going to do what Hook did," Emma said frightening her family for a second. "I'm going to use the town line. Get Gold to go over it. No magic. No Dark One. No problem."

"Big problem," Regina exclaimed. "Gold isn't just going to allow you to frog march him over the line."

"I know. I'll have to trick him over," Emma replied.

"Trick him? How?" Regina demanded.

"I don't know how," Emma shouted losing her temper. "I just... Killian left a _note_ so people would come here. So _, we'd_ know what happened and stop Gold from doing whatever he's planning to do. I can't let him down. Not… now. I have to do something."

"OK Emma," her father said firmly. "We're with you, but we need a plan."

"How about using the element of surprise?" a voice asked from the front door.

"Hook!"

Emma was frozen. She heard her father and Regina call out his name at the same time, their voices blending together. She heard her father's stool scrap against the floor as he stood and walked across the room. Her mother was talking very fast. Agent Hill, freaking Agent Hill, was replying to her.

"Such shock on your faces," Hook exclaimed. "How many times do I have to tell you I'm a survi-"

Emma slapped him full in the face. She hadn't even noticed that she had turned to face him let alone walked across the room. Her chest was heaving, every breath fighting to exit her chest. Her blood was rushing in her veins blocking out all other sound. He turned his head back to face her, his cheek already turning red as he lifted his hand to cover it.

"Ok, maybe I deserve that," he said rubbing his cheek and eyeing her carefully like she was a skittish animal.

"You died!" She yelled, her self control unravelling completely in one go. "You went over the town line and _died._ Don't pretend that's not what happened. It's the only thing that makes sense. You killed yourself and left me behind."

"I didn't know for sure what would happen," he said, his hand moving to scratch behind his ear.

"You think that makes it better?" she spat, she lifted her hand to slap him again, but his hand flashed out and grabbed her wrist stopping it from hitting him. She writhed, twisting her hand back and forth but he only tightened his grip refusing to let her go. He gave a small jerk and she was forced off balance leaning in towards him.

"I'm sorry Emma," he whispered. The fight left her and he released her hand to swing down and hang limply at her side. "He didn't leave me much I could do and I couldn't risk putting you or anyone you care for in danger," he continued. "With what is on the line the Crocodile wouldn't hesitate to destroy this whole town if it stood in his way."

"What does he want?" Regina asked.

"To release himself from the control of the dagger," Hook replied. "Once he achieves that he will truly be without limits, to plunder and ruin lives without fear of recourse, in Storybrooke… or out in the wider world."

"He has a way to do that?" Regina asked, she mind racing with thoughts of the Dark One released into an unsuspecting world without magic.

"Yes," Hook nodded, "He's been collecting magic, collecting magical beings, to fuel the spell. He's been having me aid him. Controlling me with my heart. But in his arrogance he couldn't see that he gave me just a little too much freedom. I couldn't come to warn you, but I could take myself away from the equation. Remove his precious ingredient."

"Ingredient?" David asked.

"Aye Mate, he needs my heart as part of the spell," Hook explained. "The heart of someone who knew him before he became a monster."

The room fell into silence again, but this time there was an added heavy edge of panic from everyone in the room. If what Hook was saying was true they had been teetering on the edge of disaster with no idea it was happening. Possibly more worryingly, they were going to have to go up against a bloodthirsty Gold with almost no preparation or plan.

"When did he take your heart?" Emma asked into the silence.

"That night he nearly tricked you into taking away your magic. I attempted to stop you and he took it," Hook answered.

"That long," Emma said her voice sounding dead.

"Aye," Hook said concern etching his features but at a loss for what to say to improve her mood.

"I never knew," Emma mumbled.

"Why would you?" Hook asked, forcing conviction into his tone. "The Crocodile has done this too many times to give anything away." Then he smiled softly and lifted her chin gently with a delicate finger. "But I would like my heart back now Swan."

"You know I have it?" she asked.

"This is my cue for some sentiment about how you've had it since we first met," he said, trying out a cheeky grin.

"It'd be wasted considering the mood I'm in," she said flatly.

"Fair enough," he said letting the smile drop. "But despite that, I knew the second we walked in here, that it's safe with you."

"Belle gave it to me. Regina knows where it is and she can put it back," she replied, the fire reigniting behind her eyes like smoldering coal. Then she walked past him, out the front door closing it behind her, ignoring the calls to come back.

…..

Emma only stopped when the cold night air hit her face pinching her skin where tears were sliding down her cheeks. She shouldn't have walked out. It was selfish and weak, giving in to her old impulse to cut and run rather than face new pain, but she couldn't bear to see that heart again, even to see it returned to his chest. It was irrational, but if she ignored it she could pretend just a little bit more that he was fine and that she hadn't missed the fact his heart had been missing for days.

"Emma?" a kind gentle voice called to her from the cold night and stepping into the lamp light appeared the pale blue shimmering image of Elsa. The ice sorceress had never looked more like a magical queen than she did then with the light reflecting off her dress and pale hair. "Emma?" Elsa repeated concern edging into her voice when her friend didn't reply.

"Oh, Elsa. Sorry, I know you and Anna need to return home quickly. We just-" Emma started to say, but the queen waved away her apology.

"No no, forget that. I heard about Hook, I'm so sorry Emma. Hook was a hero, even if he was a pirate. I liked him." Elsa said.

"Well good because he's back now," Emma said trying to sound flippant.

"What do you mean?" Elsa asked.

"He came to life," Emma said. "He's in there with my parents and Regina." Elsa looked between the loft and Emma a look of concern and confusion on her face.

"Ok," she accepted. "But then why are you out here?"

"I barely processed the fact that he'd…." Emma sucked in a breath annoyed that she couldn't say the word. "And now he's back and acting like nothing much happened and we should all carry on fighting the big bad like normal and I just can't deal with that on top of…." The street lights flickered around them throwing the reflections from Elsa's dress into crazy shapes.

"I get it," Elsa said taking Emma's hand and giving it a squeeze. "Want me to cover for you?" The lights returned to normal and Emma gave her a watery smile.

"I'll be at the sheriff's station," she said gratefully and giving her friend's hand a quick squeeze in return. Emma turned and walked away into town.

…..

"OK, here it is," Regina said putting the box holding Hook's heart back on the dining table. Everyone was intently not drawing attention to the awkward atmosphere after Emma had walked out and watched patiently as she opened the lid.

"Huh," David said. "It looks brighter now doesn't it?"

"It's looking pretty dim to me," Hook complained. "It was much brighter the last I saw it."

"It looked like it didn't have any magic at all when Emma showed it to us before," Snow said. "It was just a heart. Now you can see the light glowing."

"Will it still work?" Hook asked Regina in concern.

"You're walking and talking aren't you?" she snarked back. "Then it's working." There was a burst of laughter and the group looked up to see Agent Hill gaping at them all in disbelief.

"You people are so freaking calm," he said between laughs. "That's a heart. It's his heart," he said pointing at Hook. "And it's glowing and moving and it's keeping you alive even though it's not in your chest."

"That's right Mate, good summary," Hook said condescendingly.

"Why did you bring him here?" David hissed.

"He caught me climbing out the trunk of his car, so the jig was well and truly up, what difference did it make bringing him along?" the pirate replied.

"He's FBI, you might not know what that means but if he tells someone-"

"He'll get locked away with the other lunatics," Hook interrupted. "Won't you Jack?" He turned to Hill who was still laughing quietly.

"I must be dreaming," the agent muttered to himself. Snow took pity on him and gently pushed him towards a stool to sit down and then, not as gently, forced his head down between his knees and commanded him to breath slowly.

"There see? No problem," Hook said. "Now your majesty if you don't mind. I'm ready."

Regina had been studying the heart as the others had talked and had been surprised to see that David had been right, the light had gotten brighter and it continued to grow. It wasn't back to a magical heart's usual glow but it was well on its way. She gently lifted the organ out of the box and held it in front of Hook's chest. Then she stopped.

"Something wrong?" Hook asked.

"Maybe we should leave it out," she said.

"What?" Hook growled angrily.

"We need bait for Gold. Now we have something that's important to him," she said her hand lowering to her side, although she didn't put the heart down.

"You can't leave Hook like this," Snow protested.

"He'll want it wherever it is, in my chest or in a bloody box will make no difference," Hook argued.

"It might make him suspicious if you don't put it back," Hill offered. "Then the ploy of using it as bait gets undermined." They looked at him in surprise. "Sorry about before," he said calmly, the hysterical laughter now gone. "A dead guy just crawled out of my trunk and took me to find his missing heart. It threw me for a moment. "

"It's ok happens to the best of us," Charming said. "And thanks, that's actually a good point."

"So what is your plan then?" Regina asked. A knock at the door interrupted them and Elsa appeared with an apologetic look on her face.

….

"Mom," Henry demanded the instant he answered his phone. "Are you OK? You said you'd be back by now."

"Henry," Regina answered him. "I'm sorry I had to leave you on your own after everything, something came up."

"Is everything OK?" her son asked a tinge of fear in his voice.

"Yes, well, yes and no," she replied. "Hook's back."

"He's back? As in he's alive? I knew he wouldn't just leave mom."

"I'm starting to think there's no force that can stop that pirate," Regina sighed.

"So what happened?" Henry said, any trace of worry obliterated by his happy tone. Regina wasn't entirely sure how happy she was that her son was so attached to an infamous pirate.

"We're not sure," she admitted. "But he says he woke up in that FBI agent's car a little over an hour ago," she paused wondering how much she should tell him. "Which is right about when Belle gave Emma his heart," she admitted deciding she had spent far too long building barricades between herself and her son in the past. She wanted him to trust her and including him was a big part of that.

"So Grandpa did take it?" Henry said in a tone Regina couldn't quite decipher. "And now Mom has it. You think mom did something to bring him back to life," he said, not questioning the possibility even slightly.

"It's not like he woke up as soon as his body got back into town," Regina mused out loud. "And according to Belle, she only found the heart because Gold was pretty angry about it. Maybe when Hook went over the line and died, the heart lost it's magic and became a lump of… average heart." She heard Henry scoff at her attempt to shield him from the gory details and could see him rolling his eyes in her mind. "It's not like it could be used as a connection to him anymore if he was already dead."

Her eyes drifted over to the pirate who was looking relatively cheerful now his major organs were all back where they should be. His colour was almost back to normal although he did still have a slight grey tinge at the edges and he wasn't moving with his usual fluid grace, despite doing his best to cover it up. Regina shuddered a little, imagining how bad he must have looked when he first woke up. It's not like the FBI had access to preservation spells. The pirate was lucky Jack had brought him back inside the town line so quickly, he probably hadn't even been out of rigor.

Speaking of Hill, the agent kept throwing the newly arisen man distrustful glances as if Hook had pulled this whole stunt purely to mess with him. Scanning the rest of the room she saw Snow was busy with settling Neal for bed but seemed distracted, her eyes lingering on Hook and then the door Emma had left through. Elsa didn't seem any different, but she didn't know the other queen all that well. Laughingly, Charming seemed the most outwardly pleased at Hooks resurrection, hovering near the pirate and repeatedly asking if he was alright.

Regina frowned, wondering what Emma was up to and whether it was a good idea to leave the saviour on her own. A matching frown would appear on Hook's face whenever he had a moment for his own thoughts and she guessed he was wondering the same thing.

"So, is that what happens if someone dies after their heart is removed? It stops being magical?" Henry's voice asked into her ear, reminding to pay attention to what she was doing.

"I don't actually know," Regina admitted. "It never happened to anyone I…." Her regrets stole her voice and her eyes flicked back to Special Agent Hill. She really didn't want to be talking about her past evil deeds. "My mother had a way of keeping her victims partially alive with her magic," she went on. "If she already had their heart, but they were basically stumbling dead puppets."

"Like zombies?" Her son asked entirely too excited by the concept.

"It's the heart itself that becomes a magical object," she said continuing with the explanation. "The person the heart comes from doesn't gain any magic per se. They're just kept alive by the spell on the heart."

"So could you use another organ other than a heart?" Henry asked.

"And we've reached the limit of how much I'm happy for you to know about this," Regina said in an overly pleasant tone.

"Mom," Henry moaned. "Please, one more question? I thought no magic could be destroyed? What happens when a heart gets crushed?"

"The spell is over, the magic is released and without a link to that magic the person the heart belongs to dies," Regina answered.

"So thinking contrary-wise," Henry said. "If the person the heart belongs to dies the magic in the heart would have nothing to act on and…." His voice faded out as he tried to puzzle out the problem.

"Become dormant," Regina said finishing his thought. "That explains the heart's magic gaining strength once Hook was near to it again."

"So something else must have happened to trigger his resurrection, something Mom did? Henry offered.

"Maybe," Regina admitted. "But I don't think Emma's knows what she did."

"So what's wrong? You said something was wrong too," Henry reminded her.

"It's Gold, he's trying to free himself from the dagger," Regina said. "If he does no one will be able to stop him. If he comes to the house Henry do not let him in, you'll be safe as long as you stay in there. There's enough protection magic on that place to give a flock of Dark Ones trouble."

"But Mom-"

"Please Henry do as I say," Regina commanded. "Don't worry we have a plan. Everything will be fine I promise."

She said goodbye and hung up, gripping the phone tightly for a brief moment, willing nothing to happen to her son while she was away from him. She walked back into the main room and looked around in confusion.

"Where's Hook?" she asked.

"That bloody pirate," David growled looking up from where he was helping Snow with Neal. "He must have snuck out. This time _I'm_ going to kill him."

…..

It was unsettling to be retracing his steps. The last time he'd walked this path he'd been about to sail into oblivion. The dock's wooden boards creaked loudly under his feet in the still night and he felt his heart give a little thump in surprise. It was one of the best things he'd felt in days, it was one of the only things he'd felt in days. Being heartless wasn't just the agony of being under another's control, it was the way the whole world became blunted and distant. You were a lifeless creature going through the motions but not fully experiencing anything. He would die a thousand deaths rather than be trapped like that again.

Even as he had that thought he knew it wasn't true. The image of his Swan raging in pain because of him flashed before his eyes and his newly returned heart allowed him to feel the full force of his regret and shame. _You killed yourself and left me behind._ Her accusing voice stabbed through him like a knife.

"Hey!" another voice called. Hook sighed and slowed so Agent Hill could catch up with him.

"What is it Mate?" He asked. "I'm grateful to you and all but I am sort of in the middle of something."

"You really think sneaking off was a good idea?" Hill demanded. "You're just putting yourself in unnecessary harm's way."

"I can take care of myself," Hook replied gruffly.

"Oh sure, it's not like you've had your heart torn out recently," the agent replied, sarcasm dripping from every word.

"Well you're here now so you can protect me," Hook replied with just as much sarcasm. Hill matched his glare at first but then his face fell into a mix of confusion and skepticism.

"Are you really Captain Hook?" he asked.

"Yes," Hook replied.

"From the story?"

"I'm not out of any children's tale, Mate,"

"But... Neverland?" Hill half asked. Hook rolled his eyes.

"If it'll speed this up, fine," he exclaimed. "I am bloody Captain Hook, from bloody Neverland, and yes Peter bloody Pan was real too and let's thank every deity that that monster is dead. Now can we move on?" Hill's mouth hung open and for a second Hook thought someone had frozen him in place magically.

"Open the box there," Hook commanded and nodded at a salt and grit storage bin that sat against the wall for when the docks got icy in winter or when an ice queen was about.

"What?" Hill managed to ask.

"The box," Hook said patiently. "That's why I've come here, to retrieve my effects."

Hill approached the gritting box with caution as if worried it'd spring to life and bite him. He opened it and reached in, pulling out a shining silver hook.

"Ah," Jones said happily, grabbing it from his hand and clicking it smartly into place in the brace at his left wrist. "There now," he smiled waving it at the astonished special agent. "All better." He turned and walked back towards town, Hill jogging to keep up with him.

"You heading over to Sheriff Swan?" Hill asked. Hook didn't reply. "The others thought it would be better if Regina or David went to tell her the plan," he tried. Still no response. "She's really angry with you."

"She has a right to be doesn't she?" Hook snapped royally fed up of the special agent's voice.

"Yeah," Hill agreed laughing. Hook clenched his jaw in an effort not to use his newly returned hook to knock the other man's head off. "I mean you did kill yourself."

"It's not as simple as that," Hook replied.

"Isn't it?"

"You don't know anything about what's been going on."

"I think that's probably how Swan feels about it too," Hill commented. Hook growled, unwilling to admit he might be right. "So you have a plan?" Hill asked.

"For Gold? I think what we discussed with the others might just work," Hook replied.

"No for talking to the Sheriff, Emma," Hill said.

"Why are you so worried about my relationship with Emma?" Hook asked.

"Hey, I'm the agent assigned to your case I feel responsible for you now," he replied giving the pirate a cheeky smile.

"You're a sarcastic bastard you know that? Hook complained.

…

It was one minute past midnight. A new day had started but Emma was still stuck going over the last one. Too much had happened for it only to have been one day. This time yesterday she had been sleeping, stupidly blissfully dreaming, thinking she'd got through the Shattered Sight with all her loved ones together and safe and at the same time Hook's dead body had been floating all alone on the ocean. What kind of a person did that make her? Not a Saviour that's for sure. Not that she'd ever wanted to be one. She hadn't asked for this. She hadn't even been born yet when Rumpelstiltskin had decided her fate for her. She felt a flare of anger. That man, imp, crocodile, whatever he was, everything always came back to him.

There was a sharp tapping on the bug's passenger side window and she jumped. She saw the silver hook resting against the glass and wondered if she should just throw her car into gear and drive off. Instead she leaned over and popped the lock so Killian could open the door. She felt cold and stiff, as she moved and winced as she pulled herself back to her side of the car. How long had she been sat here?

She hadn't meant to end up sitting in her car for the second time that night. After everything with Ingrid she had resolved to stop hiding in her lonely refuge every time her fears got the best of her. That hadn't lasted long had it? She had driven to the Sheriff's Station just like she'd told Elsa, but couldn't bring herself to leave the car once she'd got there. The thought of those photographs sitting on her desk frightening her in ways that made her angry at herself. The subject of those photos climbed into the seat next to her and frowned.

"It's bloody cold in here Swan, why have you not put the heating on?" Killian asked. He reached out and flicked the dials but as the engine was off so nothing happened.

"What do you want?" she asked in reply.

"What do you think Swan? To talk," he said sadly.

"I don't feel like talking yet," she said.

Hook tilted his head to the side in surprise. It took a moment before what she'd said filtered through her brain. Yet. She'd said yet, meaning she did want to talk to him just not right now. Hook gave her tiny smile and nodded and she felt annoyed and glad that he understood her so well. Not only that, he was happy to give her the time and space she wanted instead of demanding they clear the air right now. Then again, maybe he didn't want to talk about it either and was just being a coward.

"Will you come back to your parents?" Hook asked. "I fear whatever the Crocodile was planning was due tonight and the longer we delay the more likely he is to discover my return."

Emma felt a spike of fear and her hand found his, gripping him tightly. He was cool to the touch and his skin felt oddly firm and stiff rather than it's normal mixture of soft flesh and hard calluses. She met his eye and he looked forlornly back at her. Right, he felt like a dead man, because he'd gone off and died. He knew what this would do to her. She may not be the most talkative when it came to feelings and that stupid L word, but she had told him that much. She let go of his hand sharply and turned the ignition, fixing her eyes stubbornly on the road ahead. She moved so quickly she hadn't noticed that his hand had regained it's proper warmth where she'd touched.

Hook had noticed though, he felt the warmth spread up his arm and to his chest, where it filled him up from head to toe. He sucked in a deep breath as he felt his muscles finally loosen completely. He let it out again slowly, revelling in the knowledge he was truly alive again and he was overcome with just how in love with this woman he was. His maddening brilliant Swan. She flicked and irritated glance at him and he realised he had been staring at her and refocused his gaze on the road ahead of them. He licked his lips and fought down the impulse to say something stupid.

"We, er… should keep an eye out for Hill, I sent him on ahead," he said. Emma grunted in response. Taking both their characters into account Hook guessed Emma didn't like the aggressively sarcastic special agent.

"So what is the plan then," Emma asked as she pulled up outside her parent's loft.

"Your idea to use the town line had merit and Regina has come up with a good idea using me as bait."

"Bait? Are you insane?" Emma exploded.

"I'll have you all there to watch out for me," Hook said soothingly. "No more acting alone. No more doubts and fear. We're in this together. Isn't that right?" He dipped his head to look up at her with his soft earnest face on, the one he'd started using against her in Neverland and only got out when her walls were at their highest, and just like every time he'd used it before she felt her resolve weakening a little despite how shut off she was.

"He'll be suspicious of anything we do to get him to the line," Emma said carefully, deflecting the conversation back to safer ground.

"That's why _we_ aren't going to be the ones to bait him," Hook said smiling.

….

 **Author's note:** Only one chapter to go. I hope you enjoyed this one and it wasn't too melodramatic, it's a hard balance to keep the plot going and give the characters time to freak out about everything. Thank you again for the reviews, I really look forward to reading them. They make writing so much more enjoyable.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter six

Rumpelstiltskin stood alone inside his shop. The doors and windows were shut and the lights off. All the clocks and chimes had been frozen in time. The room was as still as a tomb, and it might as well have been one. It would appear the only lasting legacy of Rumpelstiltskin would be Gold's Pawnbroker's. A cluttered space filled with the remnants of other people's lives. All that planning, everything he had risked,everything he had lost and that bloody pirate had stolen his chance of freedom just as it was in his grasp.

He walked with solemn steps out of the front door letting it swing shut behind him as he looked up. There wasn't a single cloud and the stars were visible sparkling across the rich dark sky. He recognised their pattern immediately, he must have looked at it a thousand times on the lid of the Sorcerer's hat. The moment he had been waiting for, now mere minutes away. The stars were nearly in alignment for the spell, but he no longer had the necessary ingredient, the link to his past lost because one arrogant pirate took it upon himself to die. Rumpelstiltskin cursed and growled in impotent fury.

He needed to go home and talk to Belle. He knew she hadn't completely accepted his excuses for his fowl mood and the Saviour's visit had only put more tension between them. He could salvage this, he would find a way to keep Belle from discovering that he had given her an imitation dagger and she would forgive him for his recent behaviour. If he had Belle then he would be alright. He would find the strength to try again, to discover a new path to freedom and power, as long as he had Belle by his side he could achieve anything.

He heard another voice cursing and Gold slipped silently into the shadows surrounding his shop. Special Agent Hill cursed again as he rounded the corner struggling to pull a ringing phone from his pocket. He looked at the screen and frowned in confusion before putting the phone to his ear.

"Special Agent Hill," he announced into the device. "What?... Is this a joke? Do you know what time it is?..." His face changed from irritated to confused as he listen to whoever had called him. "... No. Really… Yes, I did put out a find and report on Killian Jones but-.… Which road?"

Agent Hill had continued walking towards Granny's and Gold had no trouble following him as the man's attention was solely on his phone. Gold watched with interest as Hill heaved a pained sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose with one hand as he spoke into the phone

"Actually I do know it. I drove up it just yesterday. It's the only road into a town called Storybrooke…. Storybrooke. It's a coastal town-... well I'm standing in it, so I don't really care what Google Maps says…." Hill rolled his eyes at something the person on the other end of the phone said and checked his watch grimacing at the time he saw there.

"Look Officer," Hill said sharply, probably interrupting whoever had called him. "Thank you for reporting the sighting but if you read the full statement I sent out you'll see I am looking for a _dead_ _body._ Dead men do not walk along lonely country roads. Or are you suggesting that he came back to life and tried to walk home?"

Gold's eyes widened in surprise. It couldn't be. The pirate came back to life? Gold remembered Regina's sheriff plaything during the curse. That man had lived in a realm without magic while Regina held his heart. So, maybe… was it possible? Did he dare to hope? Gold looked up at the stars again. So close, he was so close. He couldn't waste this chance. In a whoosh of red he disappeared.

"Yeah? Well same to you!" Hill yelled into his phone and then made a big show of hanging up a call and shoving it back into his pocket. "Well?" he asked the woman hiding in the doorway next to him.

"Hook, line and sinker," Regina smirked. "Come on." She held out her hand, so she could transport them after Gold. Hill hesitated. The thought of being magicked from one place to another was disconcerting enough but to put his life into Regina's hands felt even worse. He wrapped his wrist in his other palm trying to feel more secure. The mayor got bored of waiting for him. He saw her wave her hand in a sharp movement and then he was surrounded by purple clouds.

…..

Gold appeared in a swirl of magic between the trees a way up from the town line. He had lived far too long to take anything at face value but the tick tock progressively counting down the time remaining until the stars found their alignment, was ever present in his mind. He spared the sky a brief glance quickly assessing that he still had precious minutes.

The night around him hummed with latent magic and the croaking and rustling of the forest's animals. Then a movement in the shadows on the road caught his eye and he stepped from the gloom and onto the road proper to get a better look. The shape was about two foot beyond the painted town line, tall and moving stiffly back and forth with painfully small steps. Gold walked cautiously towards the figure, being mindful of the bright orange painted line which cut across the road in front of him.

As he approached, the recognisable shape and features of Captain Hook resolved themselves from the darkness and Gold had to control a cry of triumph. The pirate was rocking in the spot, seemingly trapped on the other side of the town line. His eyes was half closed his stare unfocused as he came up against the invisible barrier of magic that surrounded the town. Gold tried to get his attention but the pirate continued to stare unseeing up the road towards Storybrooke. Only barely alive maybe? His body being called back to his heart even from the land without magic, Gold surmised. No matter, maybe it was enough life for Gold's purposes.

He quickly summoned his bag feeling his magic deposit the handle right into his palm. He strode confidently towards the painted line and reached inside the bag, his hand grasping the cold hard edges of the Sorcerer's hat in its box form but nothing else.

Gold desperately searched the bag but the heart was not there. He nearly screamed in frustration. Checking the stars confirmed that they continued to move ever closer to their alignment, his time was running out. If he had known where the heart was he could have summoned it, but he had tossed the bag containing the heart and hat aside when he thought his dream of freedom was dead and he hadn't thought to check it again until this moment.

Then a thought occurred to him, the heart had been imbued with _his_ magic and it should be child's play to use a simple tracking spell to find it again. He checked the stars position again and created a small point of red light that bobbed in front of of him for a moment before it flew in a quick straight line directly into the pirate's chest. Hook flinched in surprise his face losing it's blank expression, a maddeningly familiar smirk taking its place as he saw the realisation growing on Gold's face.

"You have it back," Gold snarled.

"Aye," Hook replied insolently his eyes flashing with centuries of hate. "Now!" he yelled and dived to the side just in time to avoid the blast of icy wind the Elsa threw at Gold's back.

The Dark One managed to turn in time but the gale force torrent was too fast and drove him back two steps before he planted his cane against the ground and with a wave of his hand the flow of wind bent like a straw and flew up into the sky.

"Sorry Dearie that's-"

Fire hit him this time, interrupting his threat before he could make it. He caught Regina's next fireball with contempt, but as his other hand was gripping his cane and he didn't have another free to stop the blast of white light Emma flung at his face pushing him back another step.

"What are you trying to-?" Gold cut off his own question as he looked down and saw the painted orange stripe lying between him and the town "No!" he exclaimed moving to step back towards the line.

A sword came flying at his chest and he brought his hand up on reflex amazed when his magic flowed out as it should and rendered the sword into metallic dust. An arrow bolt flew at him next but he plucked it from the air two inches from his face.

He looked up and saw the assembled heroes standing in a line across the road before him, each preparing for the next strike. Emma, Elsa and Regina, concentration fixed on their expressions as they summoned up their magic. Snow pulling arrows while Charming and even Agent Hill raised their guns to aim for his head. Hook was moving around to join them while staying out of the line of fire and Gold spared him a wicked snarl before he looked over his shoulder and sent out his senses feeling the true town line only two steps from his back. They had moved the painted line closer to the town and made it look like the pirate was still heartless trapped on the other side to lure him in.

"Very clever," he growled.

Hill and Charming opened fire but Gold didn't move, allowing the bullets to hit him with an unimpressed look on his face, until Elsa and Emma joined hands and threw their power together. Blasts of bright magic soared at Gold that were so bright everyone had to turn away to protect their eyes. The rush of magic created a crashing sound when it hit him and he shifted another step under the brunt of the blow. They couldn't keep it up for long though. Their energy waning, the light fizzled out and left them gasping for breath. Gold actually looked impressed. Then he smiled and pointed above them to the night sky.

"It's time," he announced.

Gold threw something straight up into the air and it exploded into beautiful pink and purple lights that sparkled with stars and constellations spinning in a lazy spiral. Everyone was momentarily distracted by the beautiful sight and that was a fatal mistake. Gold's magic washed over them like a scythe, freezing them in position looking up at the swirling magic and unable to see what Gold was doing.

"Now Captain, I'll be taking that back. I need it more than you," Gold sneered.

Emma heard the horrible crunching thud and started screaming, except the sound couldn't exit her throat, echoing uselessly inside her head as she imagined Gold's hand striking inside Killian's chest and tearing his heart out again. She glared furiously at the sparkling magical galaxy above them and felt useless tears fill her eyes.

"Well, maybe everything hasn't gone to plan, but this next part, I'm really gonna enjoy," Gold snarled triumphantly.

Emma felt her own heart freeze in her chest, her uselessness tearing her to pieces. This wasn't happening. After everything, after Hook had somehow managed to come back to her again. They weren't even talking about another realm or curses this time. He came back from being _dead_ and now she was going to lose him all over again? She hadn't even talked to him properly since he came back. Why had she wasted time being angry and closed off when she should have been spending every second with him? She fought against the spell and strained her ears desperately trying to work out what was happening.

"Why can't I..?" Gold growled in frustration.

"Because I commanded you not to," Belle declared. "Release everyone and drop the heart."

Emma's heart soared. She had never been so grateful to hear the librarian's voice. She fell forward suddenly as Gold's hold over them disappeared. Belle was holding the Dark One dagger, her fist tight around the handle as she stepped threateningly towards her husband. Emma checked over everyone seeing they all looked alright and then she saw Killian. He had fallen to his knees at Gold's feet and his brightly glowing red heart was clutched desperately in his hand. She fought her impulse to run to him and moved carefully forward trying not to startle Belle and Gold.

The stars and magic above them suddenly faded and shot down to the ground in a beam, a brass and star covered box appearing where it touched the asphalt of the road. Gold looked at the box, a bewildered expression of loss on his face. He looked back at his wife and Emma saw Belle's features were fixed in a mask of anger.

"Belle what are you doing?" Gold demanded.

"Finally facing the truth," Belle replied her voice trembling

"Put the dagger down, let me explain-"

"No," Belle cut in harshly. "I'm talking now. I thought I saw something in you, something good. When I found that heart, I... I finally realized that all the signs I'd been seeing were correct. You'd never give up power for me, Rumple. You never have. You never will."

"There's nothing wrong with power, not when it means that I... that _we_ can have it all," Gold argued, stumbling over his words.

"Remember the gauntlet?" Belle asked. The heroes behind her exchanged confused glances but Gold appeared to understand, an expression of horror crossing his face. "You said it could lead you to someone's weakness, to the thing they loved the most. Well, you know where it led me? To the real dagger, the one you said you had given me as a symbol of not only our relationship but of you and how you'd changed."

"Please, Belle," Gold begged, his eyes wide. "I... I... I'll make it up to you. I've changed once before. I can do it again."

"You've never changed," Belle said, the emotion draining from her voice and face. "Strengthen the town line magic, you need to protect this town." she commanded, her voice strong and final as she held up the dagger. "Make it so _only_ those who are invited can enter, everyone else… everyone else is lost to us."

Her tears had left shining tracks on her face but her eyes were dry as she spoke and Gold's face was a picture of pain as he turned to the line beside them and waved his hand in a wide arc, the air shimmered with a white light as if a wall of creamy water suddenly stood in front of them, then it faded to nothing, but Emma could sense the magic he'd lain at the line like a solid force pushing them back towards town and anyone outside away from Storybrooke.

"Please," Gold tried, sounding more terrified than any of the heroes had ever heard him sound before.

"No," Belle replied bluntly. "It's too late. Once I... I saw the man behind the beast. Now there's only a beast. Rumpelstiltskin, I command you... to leave Storybrooke."

It was like an invisible rope was pulling at him. His feet slid backwards on the tarmac as he turned away from the town line and made to grab Belle, but she was already out of reach.

"Belle, no. Please," he begged. Belle didn't reply, she just watched as her husband moved ever closer to the line and away from her and she felt her heart shatter into broken pieces. "I... I... I don't want to lose you," Gold shouted as he struggled against the dagger's will moving his feet. Then the milky shimmer enveloped him and he was over the line, crumbling to the ground as his leg gave out and the force driving him backwards released him.

"You already have" Belle whispered. Snow and Charming rushed over to Belle and pulled her away from the line and Gold's begging cries.

"Belle, please. I'm afraid. Belle! Belle! No! Belle. Belle, please!"

Elsa and Hill had already started back down the road giving everyone privacy and Emma moved to follow but found herself tugging on Killian's arm when he refused to move. He was frozen in place staring down the road at the pathetic figure of Rumpelstiltskin as he cried on his knees for his wife to forgive him. Killian's face was unreadable as he watched the scene, but Emma could guess at the dark and distant memories that were running through his mind.

"Killian," she called out softly. "Hook," he flinched and looked down at her. "Leave him, let's go home." He looked into her eyes for a long moment and then allowed her to lead him away up the road. He never turned to look back even when Gold fell silent.

….

"So, I'm still confused," Hill commented as he walked alongside the others on the way back to the cars. Emma rolled her eyes at him. "No really," he protested. "If the town line was a barrier protecting the town, even before Gold made it stronger, how did I get in?" Emma stopped walking in surprise, blinking at him with no answer.

"I know how Jack."

He turned at the use of his first name and cocked his head at the Mayor. Regina leveled a serious look at him and his gut twisted into knots as she studied him.

"You stole Hook's body and brought it back to Storybrooke," she said. Hill opened his mouth to protest, aware that everyone had now stopped to stare at them.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he said.

"That's because my curse stops you from remembering what you did," Mayor Mills said. Hill felt his face go slack. _Her curse?_ "You're actually from this town originally, and you carry a piece of it with you wherever you go. I think that's what allowed you to cross the line," the Mayor continued. "I know because I'm the one that banished you, around thirteen or fourteen years ago."

"Regina," Snow gasped.

"I don't understand," Hill said taking a step towards the mayor. She looked regretful but that odd feeling of distrust flared up in his head as he looked at her and fuelled a growing anger that wouldn't allow him to feel any pity for her.

"How did you end up on this case? Do you remember?" she asked him.

"I… I asked for it, another agent was assigned originally but I convinced our supervisor to let me have it," he answered in confusion. What did that have to do with anything?

"Was that after you heard about Hook's note?" Regina asked.

"Yeah, I read a copy in the office," he said. Regina nodded.

"You recognised the location and the missing heart probably helped too. As soon as you realised Storybrooke was in danger you made sure you did everything you could to protect it from the outside world. Because that's what my curse was designed to do."

"I'm not…" Hill started denying, but the mayor shook her head silencing him.

"Here," she held out her hand and motioned for him to give her his. He nearly didn't. He nearly turned back the way they'd come and ran screaming over the town line, but at the end of the day he was an investigator and he couldn't turn away from the truth. He gave the mayor his hand and she held it gently, turning it so his sleeve pulled up and revealed his wrist. She hesitated for a moment before she waved her hand over his and a shimmer glossed over his skin revealing a silver charm bracelet around his wrist where there hadn't been one before.

"What is that?" he gasped.

"It's the talisman I used to bind you to the town," she said sadly. "It ensured you would continue to be under my control even outside the town line, but I could only leave a few simple commands. I cursed you to be Storybrooke's protector from the outside world. To put yourself in a position of power that would allow you to complete that function and never stray too far, so that you'd be able to act when it was necessary. I needed you to do it unwaveringly, so I made sure even you weren't aware of your own actions. I am sorry for what I've done. This may be cold comfort to you now, but I have changed. I'm trying to make amends. I want to do that for you. I can introduce you to your sister,"

"My sister?" Jack asked still staring dumbfounded at his wrist.

"Yes, your twin, or at least you were twins. She hasn't aged in Storybrooke so you're quite a bit older than her now," Regina explained awkwardly.

"My twin sister," Jack repeated in a daze.

"Jill," Regina supplied.

"Like Jack and Jill?" Emma asked, her voice startling Jack who'd forgotten the others were there.

Regina nodded at the charms on the bracelet, there was a tiny well, a boy and girl holding hands and a bucket. She recited the nursery rhyme as she pointed out each one, ending by pointing at his head.

"Jack and Jill,

Went up the hill,

To fetch a pail of water,

Jack fell down and broke his crown,

And Jill came tumbling after."

"It was so infuriating at the time," Regina commented "I had meant to send you both, I thought it might be too big a job for one person, but you put up such a fight when we reached the town line. You broke the charm bracelet meant for your sister and fell over the line and hit your head. I remember that wound, right at your hairline. Your sister screamed and screamed and I had to drag her away. When I came back you'd disappeared. I just had to hope my magic did its work."

"Why would you do this to us?" Jack demanded.

"A man and his son from the outside world just appeared in the town one day. I have no idea how they found us, or what they wanted. After they… afterwards I worried about what would happen if more outsiders came or worse if someone got out and people learned we were here. I had brought some magical objects with me from the old world, like the bracelets. I only had so much magic so I had to choose someone who could do the job for the longest. You and your sister were the only teenagers in town, so I chose you." She gave an apologetic shrug at the end of her explanation as if the bombshells she'd just dropped should be understandable.

Jack was reeling, everything in his life was a lie. Even joining the bureau had been this curse at work forcing him into a position where he could protect a town he didn't even remember. He had a twin sister he didn't remember for craps sake. He really did steal Jones' body and bring it here. How often had he acted without knowing why, only to forget about it afterwards. He could have done anything in that state. Oh god, had he ever killed anyone?

He looked down at the bracelet around his wrist repulsed by the thought of it touching his skin. He tried to rip it off but the delicate looking metal only cut into his fingers.

"Stop," Regina said desperately reaching out to hold his hands still. He recoiled, backpedaling into Emma and Jones who both held onto his arms, holding him up as much as preventing him from running away. "It'll only come off with my magic," she explained. "Should I...?"

"Get it off."

She waved her hand in a similar motion to before and the shimmer appeared again only this time there was also a tinkling noise and the chain broke and fell to the ground. Jack stared at it. He didn't feel any different, but he didn't trust his own feelings anymore.

"Who are you?" he asked Regina. "Fairy tale wise, I mean."

"I was… the Evil Queen, from Snow White," she admitted. Jack barked out a harsh laugh and looked at Emma and Snow who gave him sympathetic faces, faces that were also directed at the Evil Queen who'd stolen his life.

"I get that thing you said about villains not always paying for their crimes now," he said to Emma and turned away from the group to walk back to town alone. He had a sister to find.

….

"Swan?" Killian called her name into the silence of the Sheriff's station. Somehow they'd ended up alone, just the two of them in the small office. Emma snorted to herself, her parents had probably orchestrated for them to end up away from everyone else. Weren't they against this relationship last time she checked?

"You feeling bad for Hill?" Hook asked, sensing her unhappy mood and trying to ease them into the conversation before tackling harder topics. "I'm sure he'll be fine, he seems pretty tough."

Emma wished that was the problem, that would be easier to solve than the mess of thoughts and emotions she was battling with at the moment. She tried to maintain a firm grip on herself. She needed answers before she'd let anything else happen tonight. Hook owed her that.

Then she looked at him and her resolve crumbled away as if it had never been. She stumbled forward and he caught her, his arms wrapping around her as she pulled him tight against herself. She'd spent a day thinking he was gone forever and now he was back in her arms she couldn't quite believe it.

"From beanstalks and giants to wicked witches and now this. You bring me back to life Emma," he whispered into her hair.

She frowned into his chest but didn't reply. She wanted to brush the sentiment away, but his conviction removed any doubt that his words were platitudes or flattery. How could he feel that way, especially since after each of those times she'd turned around and pushed him away?

A red glow caught her attention and she turned to see him holding his heart out to her. "Please Swan," he said. He sounded so vulnerable. She took the heart and marvelled at how warm and solid it felt in her hand.

"I don't know what to do," she said.

"Regina just seemed to push it back in," he said. As if it was that simple, Emma thought. "Just be gentl-" Emma slammed the heart back in and Hook swallowed a yell.

"Sorry," Emma winced regretfully. Her lingering anger at him had mixed with the anger she was feeling at herself and made her rougher than she'd meant to be. "I thought it'd be like ripping off a band ai-"

Her apology was swallowed as he gave her a look of pure lust and threw himself at her. How had she brushed off all the weak meaningless kisses he'd been giving her. This was how her pirate kissed, putting all the love and desire in his heart into every move. Hook recovered from the surge of emotion he'd felt as his heart beat inside his chest again. Pulling back he looked into Emma's bright eyes and felt his elation quickly turn to shame.

"I'm sorry Emma," he whispered keeping their faces close together, reluctant to move away in case she didn't let him back once she'd heard his confession. "I tried to come and tell you what was happening, as usual the crocodile had covered every angle and made sure I couldn't speak."

"Couldn't have been every angle or we wouldn't have ended up with the FBI in town. So what happened?" she asked.

"I don't know where to start," Hook said. Emma pulled away and he let go of her regretfully.

"What happened after I saw you that last time?" she asked, her voice and eyes shutting down. He could practically see her walls going back up as she crossed her arms. Hook sighed in defeat.

"After I saw you here before the curse, I went back to the docks in the hopes I'd be far enough from other people to prevent my hurting them," he explained. "Then the curse hit and… nothing happened. Turns out if your heart isn't in your chest it can't be affected. Gold had a couple of errands for me but you defeated the Snow Queen and -"

"She took it back," Emma interrupted.

"What's that Love?" Hook asked confused.

"The curse," Emma clarified. "Ingrid took it back it in on herself. She sacrificed herself." Emma sniffed but held her head higher. They'd talk about that later, now she just wanted to know what had happened to him. "Anyway, how did you end up outside the town line?"

"I saw you with your family celebrating after the curse broke and I was too cowardly to face you," he admitted."Gold's last command was to enjoy the snowfall, so decided to steal a ship. I thought I would lie on the deck and let the white flakes fall down and bury me."

Emma shuddered as that image melded with the one she'd had of him lying on the autopsy table. Hook raised his hand to comfort her but she stepped out of reach. He gave her a pleading look, but she didn't relent and his hand clenched into a fist as it fell back to his side.

"Before I even stepped off dry land, I heard the ice wall crumbling," he continued. "I imagine the sea would be held back no longer once Ingrid was gone and as a gap appeared I realised I would enjoy nothing more than having Gold's plan revealed. Maybe outside the boundaries of magic I would be able to alert you. Maybe my disappearance would be enough to make you suspicious of him. In honesty, I hadn't considered the law from the outside world would get involved. I'm sorry it must have caused a great deal of distress when Hill arrived."

Emma wanted to scream at him. Sure having Agent Hill around had been a worry but the only thing that had caused _distress_ was Killian being…. She couldn't think the word anymore. She didn't want to think it ever again. It had only been temporary, why wasn't she shaking this off and moving on like she normally did?

"I tried to write you a message but all Gold's commands would let me write was my name and the location of the town. Then the boat passed through the ice wall out of the town's limit and I knew no more. I had I left my hook hidden at the boat's berth, I figured you might find it and realise where I'd gone," Killian continued.

Emma face creased up in guilt, he'd left a clue for her to find and she hadn't even realised he was missing enough to go looking for it. Hook mistook her expression, the flash of pain on Emma's face hurt his heart more than Gold's manhandling ever had and he was filled with shame at having put her through so much.

"It's my fault I ended up there," he said pointing at the photos of his crime scene on her desk. "It was through my own actions. I was thoughtless."

"That was Gold," Emma mumbled through her rolling emotions.

"I knew about the hat," Killian spat, anger at himself building. "I knew he was up to something. But I was too desperate for you to see me as a better man. I played right into his hand. This was the fate I deserved." He stopped and looked into her eyes, his anger fading into regret. "But it wasn't what you deserved. I am so sorry for what I put you through. I will work everyday to make it up to you. I was a coward. I swear I will never again doubt you or what we have together."

"That's a big promise," Emma said.

"I'll make it again every day Swan," Hook swore.

Emma thought about his heart in its lonely wooden box, how she'd _known_ it was his and how she'd wanted to keep it safe. She had wanted it to bring him back to her. Was that all it had taken? She pressed her hand against her chest feeling her own heart beat inside her ribcage. Despite what she might tell herself, there had been a flicker of a wish, a hope that he wasn't really gone, or maybe it was something even more powerful than that. Something she was too scared to name. Everyone was always telling her magic came from emotion.

 _You must ask yourself. Why am I doing this? Who am I protecting? Feel it._

"Ok," Emma said.

"Ok?" Hook asked in surprise not having expected a quick acceptance.

"But," she added.

"But?" Hook repeated, deflating slightly.

"I'll make it too. Ingrid… she played me and Gold took advantage of how distracted we all were and he nearly…." She stepped forward finally reaching out to touch him. Her hands rested on his chest and it took everything in him not to dive down and kiss her before she'd finished. "I'm not going to risk the people I love out of fear again," she continued.

Killian's eyes widened at her use of the L word. He bit the inside of his cheek even as a wide grin spread across his face. He knew better than to draw attention to it, but he couldn't hide how happy she made him feel. Then Emma looked up into his eyes and he would swear his newly replaced heart stopped beating, because her eyes were begging him to understand what she wanted to say but couldn't.

"It's alright Love," he said, slipping the endearment in on purpose. "There's no rush. We have plenty of time. Let's just enjoy this moment together."

She smiled and he kissed her right onto it deepening the kiss as she sighed and returned it with as much feeling as she could, keeping her hand over his heart and feeling it thump against her palm.

The End

...

 **Author's note:** And we're back into cannon, except the Frozen crew are still in town. I hope you all enjoyed reading this story and I really hope it all made sense. Did anyone guess Jack's identity? I thought his name would give it away.

Thank you so so much to everyone who reviewed, followed and favourited. They are such a joy receive and they also helped shape this story. This last chapter has changed a lot following your questions. Please leave more to let me know how you liked the ending.

Thanks for reading.

Many thanks to forever dreaming transcripts, which I used for reference instead of sneaking off to watch youtube on my lunch break. You saved me a lot of possible embarrassment.


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